


THE FATHER

by Thalius



Series: Chapter 16 Rewrite [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Blood and Violence, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Rescue Missions, Season 2 Finale Rewrite
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-13
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-18 01:07:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 26,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28734702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thalius/pseuds/Thalius
Summary: He means more to me than you will ever know.Din knew it would come down to this, in the end. Gideon had always been there waiting for him, and he was tired of hiding.
Relationships: Din Djarin & Grogu | Baby Yoda
Series: Chapter 16 Rewrite [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2134737
Comments: 79
Kudos: 543





	1. ACT I

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone. The absolute shitshow that was the S2 finale has broken my brain. This is an attempt to reconcile what was set up in the show with… what we got in the finale. This fic is intended as a heavy rewrite of S2E8 and will be an AU/fix-it of sorts. I’ve tried to remain within the confines of the canon as much as possible, but there will also be some major deviations. This is also written with the assumption you have watched the finale and/or are familiar with what happens in it - I will be skipping/cutting down scenes that remain largely unchanged, as I don’t think there’s much point in re-hashing them on paper. 
> 
> Also note the warnings - this will be significantly more violent and bloody than the canon finale, with explicit descriptions of blood and injury. 
> 
> With all that out of the way, let’s gooooo baby!!!

Fett sat quietly in the pilot's seat of _Slave I_ as the midday sky of Fel-IV filled the viewport, its pale blue colour disrupted only by the puffy grey smoke of distant factories. His silence wasn't unusual; in fact, Fett was one of the few people Din had met who seemed as comfortable with the quiet as he was. But the tension in the air could not be denied, and there was no need to guess why.

"I'm sorry," Din found himself saying, gripping the back of the passenger seat's headrest. He didn't sit, in part because Fennec had adjusted the seat to her height and had yelled at him the last time he'd messed with the alignment, and partly because he was too antsy. The jitters that came before a tough fight were especially difficult to shrug off now, and his hands shook with a faint tremor when not holding onto something.

"You put those words in her mouth?" Fett responded, glancing up at him. "Princesses say what they like."

His lips twitched. "No. But your hold is crowded."

Fett huffed. "The _narudare_ will clear out soon enough." He leaned forward and flicked on the auxiliary stabilisers to lock the cargo hold's gyroscopic deck, and Din felt the ship rock ever so slightly. "I'd be more concerned with the doctor."

He frowned. "Why?"

"Imperials are good little liars."

Din stepped around the seat to catch Fett's eye. His visor turned up to meet him. "You think he's lying about the kid being alive?"

"I think he knows that unfortunate truths will get him killed," Fett replied. "You need to be prepared for that."

Din looked away, out at the sky again. Fett's words had been kind, but in the sort of no-nonsense way he'd taken for granted when he still had a covert to go back to.

He didn't even have a ship to go back to. The only way now was forward.

"I am prepared for it," he said roughly.

"And what will you do?" Fett paused to lock the controls, and turned in his chair to face him. "If the truth is unfortunate?"

The leather of his gloves creaked as he balled them into fists. He swallowed hard. "Then you will no longer be indebted to me."

Fett said nothing to that. Din didn't look at him, his visor still fixed on the viewport. The man probably thought he was a fool. Allowing himself to be put in a position where his hopes hung on the word of an Imperial medical engineer was exactly the kind of mistake that got people killed.

"I'll speak with Pershing," Din said then, unable to stand the silence. "And Bo-Katan. Get a plan ready."

"And I will be with you," Fett replied, finally making Din face him. His words had come out far more serious than usual. "No matter the truth."

His jaw clenched. "Thank you."

"Not yet," Fett said, and turned back to face the control dashboard. "I haven't done anything."

Din felt his mouth curl. Perhaps after this was all over, they could work together. It was good to speak with a _vod_ again; he'd forgotten how much he missed it.

He shoved those thoughts down as he turned to grab the top rung of the ladder, beginning his descent from the cockpit. Plans for the future could wait. He had to focus on the now.

* * *

Doctor Pershing was still restrained in his seat when Din entered the hold, and he wasted no time in stalking over to him.

The doctor's eyes widened. "What are you—"

"Mando," Cara hissed, her tone chiding. Her eyes tracked him as his long strides ate up what little distance was between him and Pershing. Din ignored her, stopping too close to the doctor in front of his seat, and touched the stock of his pistol, still holstered heavily on his thigh.

"Tell me about the kid."

Pershing was staring up at him with wide eyes, mouth quivering as words formed on his lips without sound. "I—I don't—"

Bo-Katan turned from the console she was sitting at and watched on with amusement. "Second-guessing the word of an Imperial?"

"What's happening?" Cara asked, stepping in. "Has there been an update on the kid?"

He ignored both of them, and drew his pistol. "Tell me about the kid," he said again.

"I don't—I said he was alive—"

"In what condition?"

"He's—" Pershing cowered behind his cuffed hands, flinching at the movement. "You don't need to aim that at me—"

"Then start speaking," Din replied. He held up the weapon, letting it glint in the pale light that shone from the rafters of the hold. "And you better tell me the truth. Because I will be coming back for you, one way or the other."

"He's alive!" Pershing repeated, eyes darting away, cast to the floor. His glasses were eskew, but he didn't reach up to fix them. "He's alive, I swear he is. He's—the bloodletting takes a lot out of him—he's fine!" He flinched again as Din's head snapped in his direction. "I'm telling you the truth—"

His voice rose several octaves, choking off when Din grabbed the collar of his shirt. "What do you mean?" he hissed.

"I mean he's—" Pershing's breath came out rushed, uneven, shallow. His skin was clammy, and he seemed to be debating whether or not to grab Din's arm. "He has to, to recover, after each—each, um, donation. So he might be unconscious when you find him, resting. But he's ali— _he's alive, I swear—!"_

Pershing went into full hysterics as Din hauled him up to his feet by the collar of his jacket, trembling and flinching away from the cold steel of Din's breastplate. "It's temporary!" he cried, and clutched at Din's vambrace. "He just needs to rest, that's all!"

"Will he need medical care?"

"Fluids, rest," Pershing stuttered out. "That's all. That's all, I swear that's all—"

Din shoved him back down into his seat, and the man let out a short sob that he quickly bit back.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. His gun slid back into its holster, but he kept a grip on the stock. Fett was right. Damn him, he was right.

"Mando."

Din glanced up, and found Cara watching him. Her expression was pinched with worry, though she was clearly trying to hide her concern. "Don't think about it," she whispered, and offered a smile that barely made her lips move. "We'll get him back."

He drew in breath to respond, but Bo-Katan interjected again.

"Are we ready to begin planning?"

His head turned in her direction. Ice trickled down the back of his skull, his fear dulling into a much more useful, malleable rage. Bo-Katan was still amused, still cool, still seated straight-backed in her chair. Her tone had been impatient, like a mother scolding an intemperate child.

"This is my operation," he replied coldly. "Not yours."

"I'm just trying to figure out our timeline," she said, teeth flashing. "Gideon won't be hanging around in that system forever."

"Then tell me what you have," he said, stepping around Pershing's seat and ignoring how the man flinched away from his proximity.

"You're ready to engage, then?"

He glanced at Cara, then Fennec. They both nodded. He needed no confirmation from Fett.

"Yes," he told her, and began to listen.

* * *

A 3D layout of Gideon's Imperial cruiser bathed the _Slave's_ hold in blue. As Bo-Katan explained the insertion plan, Din squinted at the hologram and ran the math in his head. The brig was in the lower decks, near the bow of the ship—the cargo bay was just behind it. He committed to careful memory their locations, found the bridge nested on the upper bow, and then scanned the hologram until he located the medical bay.

"Are there medical staff on board?" he asked Doctor Pershing.

Bo-Katan glanced at him, irritated at having been interrupted. "What does that matter?"

"The kid might be injured, or sick," he explained. "I need to know what my options are."

Pershing's shoulders twitched, dispelling some of the pressure the binders put on his back. "Um, yes, a few. They are a skeleton crew, as your friend said. They can treat the child if he's in need of care."

"Will he be?" Din hissed, and Pershing flinched.

"I don't think so," he said quickly. "The last sample we got from him was two days ago. He shouldn't be due for another cycle until tomorrow. But—"

"But?"

"The other doctors, they aren't as—concerned for his well-being as I am," Pershing said hesitantly. "And Gideon has a demanding timeline."

A muscle in his temple twitched. "Which means?"

"It means you have to be careful with him," Pershing said, shrinking away again. "But they wouldn't—he's no use to the Moff dead."

"Is the medical bay armed?" Bo-Katan interjected.

"No. They're just doctors."

"Imperial doctors," Cara muttered.

"They're on the way to the bridge," Bo-Katan noted, and highlighted the path. The medical bay was just aft of the command bridge. "We can secure it after we take control of the ship—as long as they don't get in the way."

"Do not kill them," Din stressed, and she glanced at him. "Lock them in if you have to. I doubt they'll want to engage a Mandalorian fireteam."

Bo smiled. "I'll be gentle."

"You won't be anything. Do not interact with them at all."

The pit in his stomach grew heavier. Their plan hinged entirely on timing. He had to get to the cargo bay fast enough to vent the Dark Troopers, grab the kid, and haul ass to the bridge. They would plot a random jump, and then meet up with Fett on the other side.

A stop at the medical bay would complicate things, perhaps fatally. If the kid needed intensive care, or even surgery, hyperspace would make that difficult, and doctors performing treatment under the threat of death wasn't an ideal scenario. He didn't know enough to understand why, but he knew serious medical treatment was risky during jumps—especially for children. A pang of empathy for the frog woman he'd ferried to Trask shot through his chest, but he quickly shoved it down.

They couldn't hang around and wait, either. The Dark Troopers would reorganise and plan a boarding action the second they stopped tumbling around in open vacuum, and if any officer on board the cruiser had a shred of strategic impulse in their body, Imperial reinforcements would be called to the system in short order.

But if the kid—

He closed his eyes. If the kid didn't make it, then none of this would matter.

"More live crew means more chances they call for reinforcements or sabotage us," Bo-Katan shot back, pulling him out of his thoughts. "We aren't prepared for that kind of assault. The only one we really need alive is the navigation lieutenant."

"And Gideon," Cara interjected.

"She's right," Fennec said. "This is a precision run. We can't have people hanging around."

He clenched his jaw, annoyed. A peek at Cara told him the same thing—they were right. He knew they were. He wanted to agree with them, and if this was about anyone else, he wouldn't even be bothering.

But it wasn't just anybody.

Din sighed. "Then just… keep one alive if it's a problem. Bind them and keep them on the bridge. I have an extra set of cuffs."

Bo-Katan arched a neat brow. "On hand?"

"Yes," he replied, and retrieved them from his belt. He held them out to her, and her eyes flicked down to them in distaste. "Not all Mandalorians are nobility. Some of us earn our keep."

She took them from him and hooked them onto her belt, turning back to the hologram without a word. Her smile was venomous. He didn't know how she did it—act as if everyone aside from her was a misbehaved child throwing a tantrum, all with a haughty tick of her brow. She was good at it, too.

"We'll do all we can to indulge in your sideshow," she said then, and gestured at the ship. "And hold the bridge. You'll vent the DTs in the cargo bay, grab the kid, and meet us there." Bo-Katan looked over her shoulder and addressed the loose crowd around them. "Does everyone know their roles?"

A chorus of ayes made her nod, and the display winked out. Bo-Katan stood, brushed past Din, and paused in the centre of the hold. "Fight well," she said to everyone, glancing around. "And if you can't manage that, at least die on your feet." She slipped her helmet on and made for the gangplank, a hand on the grip of her pistol. "Let's go."

He watched Koska and Fennec file out behind her and head to the _Lambda-_ class shuttle parked beside the _Slave_ , but Cara hung back. He glanced at Pershing and shoved him back into his seat with a rough push to the chest.

"You stay put."

Pershing conceded by holding up his hands. "I will cooperate, I assure you."

"Mando."

He glanced up at Cara. She was looking at him with an unreadable expression.

"What?"

She jerked her head for him to follow her, and before he had time to speak further, Cara grabbed his arm and dragged him off to the side, turning their backs to Pershing.

"You really ready for this?" she asked in a hushed tone. "You keep… twitching."

"I'm fine," he said quietly, annoyed at how unconvincing it sounded. "It'll be over soon, one way or another."

"You need to—" Cara took a deep breath, glanced at Pershing over her shoulder, and lowered her voice. "You need to comm me if… if there's something wrong. You understand? I shouldn't even be letting you go alone—"

"I need to do this by myself," he interrupted, just as quietly. "Whatever happens, I need to be the one who's there for him."

"And I get that," she replied. "But, just—don't do anything crazy if things go sideways. Okay?" she urged with an indignant frown when he didn't respond. "Say the words to me."

"Okay," he said back quickly. "Okay. I won't."

"The kid's gonna be fine anyway," she muttered as she slung her rifle over her shoulder with a conviction he wished he had. "He's a sturdy little guy."

"Yeah," he murmured, feeling his throat thicken. "Yeah, he is."

"Come on." She smacked his arm and nodded towards the gangplank leading outside, putting on her brightest battle smile. "Let's go kick some Imp ass."

* * *

He'd been on Imperial craft before—sometimes the Guild dabbled in asset recovery from ship-broken Imperial fleets, and those jobs always paid well. He'd never walked through anything as large as a light cruiser, and the ships he'd been on had mostly been long-dead skeletons, but apparently the Empire had strict aesthetic regulations that all their craft adhered to. Gideon's cruiser had identical matte grey decks, harsh white lighting that shone through the ovalled grating covering the walls, control and comms panelling that sat low to the ground, profuse amounts of open deck space, and worst of all, the same deep, blaring claxon that heralded the ship's distress rung through its halls.

Din passed the bodies of dead troopers, their sleek white armour scored with fatal carbon, and swept his pistol across the length of the bay. Bo-Katan's boarding party had been comprehensive in their insertion—they hadn't spared a single trooper or officer, and the aftermath of the firefight littered the deck. Smoke from blaster rounds still hung in the air as he stalked towards the lift that would bring him down to the cargo bay, and some of it filtered into his helmet.

He rolled the taste of it in his mouth, savouring the familiar scent. It helped bracket his focus only on the path ahead. He had done this hundreds of times before. He knew how to fight, and he knew how to win. He could do it again now. The spear clinked faintly against his jetpack as he moved, as if in reminder. The weapon would serve him well, if needed.

Din met little resistance as he made his way to the cargo bay. Occasionally a pair of Stormtroopers would run hurriedly through the halls and force him to hide until they passed, but otherwise the ship was empty. Not even mouse droids flitted across the decks, and it made his breath come quick. Pershing had been telling the truth about what resistance they would face—which was, aside from the Dark Troopers, barely anything. Maybe that meant he was also telling the truth about—

He heard footsteps and ducked into the alcove of an office door, holding his breath and his pistol tightly. More troopers, speaking frantically to each other, were running down the hall. He caught a fragment of their conversation—they were hoping the reports of a Mandalorian boarding party were false. They jogged past him at a clipped pace, their cheap plastoid armour clacking with each footstep, completely oblivious to his presence.

He exhaled when they turned the corner and shoved himself out of the alcove. He needed to focus. His tongue pressed to the roof of his mouth as he began to move again, trying to catch the lingering taste of smoke. There was no way to tell when exactly the Dark Troopers had begun powering up, but he knew they must be by now. That meant he had a maximum of four minutes to get to their bay and vent them, and he couldn't count on such an optimistic window.

The lower he went into the belly of the ship, the less troopers there were. Some hallways weren't even lit; instead they glowed a deep, faint crimson from overhead safety bulbs. His visor adjusted to the lower light threshold, and the glass took on a brown-green hue as the passive infrared imaging sensors in his visor activated. It was too risky to use his helmet lamp; announcing his arrival by flashlight could land him in a firefight, and he needed every second available to him.

He moved quietly, quickly, keeping his breathing even as he listened for other movement, but he was the only living thing down here. Just him, and the kid.

The upcoming corridor terminated in a forked path. He swung left, remembering the layout, and when he turned into the bay hallway he heard a harsh, hydraulic whine of hissing air. Nestled in the middle of the corridor wall was the alcove that opened up into the Dark Trooper staging bay, and it strobed with activation lights.

The deck shuddered beneath his feet, shaking from the impact of their movements. They were awake.

"No! No, no, no, no!"

The door to the bay groaned as it began to slide open. He picked up his pace to a sprint and saw the doors peel apart. His momentum carried him to the control panel. He slammed into the wall, ignored the harsh jolt of the impact, and frantically keyed the locking mechanism. The doors hissed again as they reversed direction, sliding back closed.

He watched them push together slowly, too slowly, until a pair of coal black mechanical hands wedged them apart. Through the widening seam of the door, he saw red, baleful eyes glare back at him as the Trooper shoved its way into the hall.

He'd been too late.

* * *

"This is too easy," Koska muttered beside her, and Bo could hear the disappointment plain in her voice as she shot down another Stormtrooper.

"Keep steady," Bo snapped back. The sharp report of Cara's rifle, followed closely by Fennec firing at an officer who was unfortunate enough to be stuck in the hold with them, rang through the room.

"Clear here!" Cara called from the port side.

"Clear!" came a responding report from Fennec, who had taken the starboard flank.

Koska's visor swivelled in Bo's direction, blasters aimed skywards. "Easy," she spat again, the modulation of her helmet making her voice that much rougher.

"You expected a hard fight from Imps?"

"No." She stepped over a body, and did one more sweep of the hold before moving for the door at the far end of the room. "Just disappointed."

Bo didn't agree. She was glad they were ploughing through so quickly. The— _Mandalorian_ had probably vented the Dark Troopers below then, otherwise a platoon of them would be here by now. Her fight with Gideon would make up for the lack of resistance they faced now, but Koska didn't have that same promise.

And she had better not get in the fucking way.

"Keep moving," Bo said, somewhat unnecessarily. Koska needed no reminder. Dune was a trained soldier, and Fennec was clearly experienced with insertion runs. None of them required much direction to press forward.

They formed up in a loose diamond as they made for the door, with Bo on point. She didn't need to pull up the cruiser's layout; she'd memorised it well before they'd come aboard. They were two decks below the bridge now, and if this was all that the Imps could throw at them, they'd be meeting Gideon in just a few minutes.

The blood pulsed in her ears with excitement. She ignored it, and fired into the corridor as they came up against a meagre fireteam of Stormtroopers before diving for cover behind a bulkhead.

Dune swore as she took a knee on the opposite wall, her gun jamming, and Fennec and Koska filled her place. Bo landed shots where she could, but it was a struggle—not because the Stormtroopers were particularly skilled at dodging them, but because her team was doing such a good job at mopping up that a crew of four was unnecessary.

That was fine. She would let them have their fun. Taking the bridge from Gideon would be more difficult, and the toughest fighting would be left to her.

They cleared the corridor of troopers quickly, and then filed into the lift. Dune was swearing at her gun; Fennec was breathing hard, but was steady on her feet. Bo looked to Koska and saw the dissatisfied tilt of her shoulders. The woman only ever cared about a good, hard fight. It was one of the reasons Bo had recruited her, but sometimes it was difficult to reign in her simpler impulses when they were fighting for something more grand than warrior's glory.

She was finding that a lot of Mandalorians struggled with the same thing these days.

"Next up is the medical bay," Bo said aloud, pulling everyone's attention to her. "It should be sealed off, just like the bridge. We'll focus on taking control of the ship first, then circle back to the medbay. Koska?"

"I have the breaching charges," she replied, patting her utility belt.

"Remember what Mando said," Cara told her, shaking her gun with an annoyed snarl until it hissed, ready to fire once more. "We need to keep a doctor alive."

"I heard him." She watched the lift indicator light up above the door. Cara shouldered her weapon, and they all braced for incoming fire.

The lift doors peeled apart. In the hallway awaited a platoon of Stormtroopers, and behind them, she saw that the command bridge airlock door was wide open.

"What—"

Bo, Fennec and Koska dove out of the lift, rolling for cover. Cara pushed forward, her rifle belting out blaster bolts and spraying the corridor—and the troopers—with plasma.

"It's open?" Koska said from the other side of the hall, bewildered. "Why—"

Bo aimed for the few troopers not cut down by Cara's spray and emptied her plasma cartridge. As she reloaded her weapon, she peered into the opening to the bridge. It looked empty; the officers must be hiding. She couldn't see Gideon either, but then he wouldn't be leaving himself out in the open.

"Clear!" Cara called, taking a knee to discharge her rifle. The barrel glowed a dull orange from the heat. "We pushing forward?"

Bo scanned the hall. Inset into the port wall just before the mouth of the command bridge was the medical bay doors—and those were sealed off tight. Was everyone hiding in there? Why would they leave the bridge abandoned?

Cara glanced at her. "Katan?"

"I'm thinking." She stood up and waved to Koska. "Get one of the charges ready, just in case. This looks like a trap."

Koska nodded and pulled out a charge satchel from her utility pouch. They were about the size of a fist, meant for precision detonations inside pressurised craft. They would punch a large enough hole in the airlock doors to allow for a wedge to pry them open.

"Primed," Koska reported, and stood up with one in her hands.

"Good. Plant it on the medbay doors as we pass, but don't set the timer yet."

Assembling once more into a loose diamond formation, they pressed forward. Bo stepped over bodies as she crept slowly to the open mouth of the command bridge. Amplifying the audial output of her helmet did nothing; she couldn't hear anyone else apart from the three women behind her. Bo grit her teeth. It made no tactical sense to abandon the bridge and leave it open for the taking. They would have access to all master controls inside, including the airlock door controls for the medbay.

As they passed the medical bay, Koska paused to stick the charge in the centre of the door, situated in the middle of the airlock seam. Then Bo held up a fist, and they all paused.

"I don't like this," she whispered. "It's too easy."

"There can't be any detonators inside," Fennec said. "That could depressurise the bridge, and then we'd all be screwed."

"They might be trying to lock us in there," Cara mused. "Set up a command base elsewhere."

"You can't remotely transfer master controls on Imperial craft," Bo said. "I've tried it before. No," she hissed then, shaking her head. "This doesn't make sense."

She clenched her teeth and listened. The others were silent, doing the same. She switched to thermals on her visor with a tap of her finger against the side of her helmet—everything showed up blue. Another tap. Dynamic change detection revealed the faint outline of boot prints outbound from the bridge, but that told her nothing she didn't already know.

Everything she saw told her it was all clear. She knew that wasn't right, but that would not stop her. Not when she was this close.

"Advance," she said then, and began to walk forward. "Be at the ready."

Silently, they moved into the command bridge, sweeping the main deck. Two floor-to-ceiling navigation consoles bracketed either side of the deck, and she turned to motion for Cara and Koska to check behind each—

The doors sealed shut behind them. Bo whirled, aiming her blasters at every empty space she could find. What the fuck was going on?

The lights cut, including the emergency bulbs, and her visor blacked out. "Lamps!" she barked immediately, and everyone switched on the flashlights attached to their weapons. A criss-cross of narrow beams lit up the bridge, sweeping at dissimilar angles to cover one another. "Gideon, you bastard, where are you—"

She finally heard movement. The deck shuddered beneath her feet, and she pointed both blasters at the source of the sound. She realised too late that her aim was low; a foot above her pistols' flashlight glowed two triangular, crimson eyes.

"Dark Trooper!" Cara yelled, and the bridge lit up with blaster fire.

* * *

His ears rang. They would for a while, he knew, probably for days. He definitely had a concussion. The wrist joint in his right arm was swollen and twisted, and several of his ribs were heavily bruised, if not cracked outright. A myriad of other small wounds throbbed at him, painful on their own and collectively overwhelming.

He shoved all of it down and stepped over the shell of the now-dead Dark Trooper, using his cloak to wipe the hydraulic fluid from the tip of the spear before sliding it back into its sling beside his jetpack. He drew his pistol as he walked past the cargo bay—which was, now, completely empty. He didn't pause to relish the sight.

The brig was not far, and the halls were completely empty now. Bo-Katan and the rest must have been successful in their breach. More successful than him, likely.

_Focus._

His heart hammered in his chest as he rounded another corner. He had to work through his adrenaline, ignore the impulse to sprint straight to the kid's cell and cut down anything that stood in his way. He needed every scrap of energy left in him, and more than anything, he needed to keep a level head.

Maybe Cara had been right; maybe he should have brought her with him. She was good at staying focused, good at keeping him out of his head. He chalked it up to the concussion. He'd done high-stakes jobs before—every job was a high-stakes job when he'd been supporting the covert—but this felt different. He knew it was different, somehow. And the kid wasn't even—

_Stop._ He paused for breath as pain lanced up his ribs, making him stumble. He reached out to the nearest bulkhead for support, and he swallowed down a hiss of breath, not daring to make any noise.

Din closed his eyes and shuddered. His hands were shaking again, and it wasn't just from fear. This had happened to him before; he was well past exhaustion now, running on adrenaline and determination alone. Pushing his body like this, to its absolute limits and then some, meant he was in this position now, unprepared and overtaxed. Regret welled in his chest, a useless emotion. He couldn't turn back now for rest, and wishing he'd done so beforehand would earn him nothing.

He just needed his body for another few hours. Then he could collapse, and let it punish him as it so pleased. Once he had the kid, he would ask a final, unfair favour of his friends—to deal with the aftermath, whatever that happened to be. He wasn't young anymore, and his strength was already leaving him.

And if the kid wasn't alive, then, well—then he would do what was required of him by Creed.

_Your path is clear,_ a voice inside his head said, sounding strangely like the Armourer. _Walk it steadily._

His grip tightened around his pistol. A shrug of his shoulder confirmed the spear was still holstered beside his jetpack. Din pushed off the bulkhead, steadied himself on his feet, and took a deep, painful breath. The next hallway opened up to the brig. He was almost there.

Taking a few more measured breaths that made his ribs ache, he began to walk again. Each footstep was careful and quiet, steeled anew with a very clear, very simple purpose.

Another hallway down, and he was there. Two guards stood outside the kid's cell, something that he found troubling as he quickly killed the both of them. _This_ was all they had in the way of armed protection? He'd seen the kid throw fire and Mudhorns around before. Stormtroopers guarding something that powerful was a joke.

The first trooper died instantly from a blaster bolt to the chest, the second falling limp to the deck with a simple twist of the neck. Stepping over both of them, he slotted Pershing's code cylinder into the control panel and keyed the locking mechanism for the door. There was a dull, internal clunk as the lock unlatched, and then the door slid open.

He turned from the panel, pistol in hand, and found Moff Gideon waiting for him.

* * *

Bo had fought in the dark before, many times. Death Watch leadership had always preferred to conduct raids at night, relying on Mandalorian discipline, the element of surprise, and the low-light output of their blaster rounds to mitigate any interference with night vision visors.

She did not have that same advantage here. They'd been flanked hard by the Dark Trooper, and its shots lit up the bay so brightly that she had to disabled her visor's NIR scanners in order not to blind herself. It meant visibility was only as good as the number of shots being fired at any given moment, but at least there were a lot of shots.

Bo took cover behind the central command console at the front of the deck and disabled her flashlight. The Dark Trooper did not make a lot of noise, but every step it took shook the deck. Cara and Fennec were shouting to one another, each taking cover behind the two floor-to-ceiling navigation panels and alternating shots to keep the thing confused. Koska was bouncing around the room, assisted by short, controlled bursts of her jetpack, landing shots where she could.

Their combined firepower barely made a dent. The Trooper's torso pivoted to spray fire in every direction, forcing Fennec and Dune to hunker down and staggering Koska.

Bo, for her part, thought. They would be killed in short order if they kept doing this. She pulled up a private channel with Koska. "You still have that extra breaching charge?"

She had to yell to be heard over the blaster fire. The Dark Trooper pivoted in her direction at the sound of her voice, and she peeked over the console to fire into its faceplate. It didn't do much good.

"Yes!" Koska barked. "You want me to plant it on the Trooper?"

Bo smiled. She could always rely on Koska in a fight. "Yes!" she yelled back. "And we need to push that thing up against the door!"

"Fuck no!" Cara shouted, close enough to hear Bo's words. "That could vent the bridge!"

A fist came down on the top of the command console, punching straight through the control panel. Bo shot out from behind it, her shoulders jarring as her jetpack let out a short burst that pushed her to the port side of the bridge.

Fennec was there, behind the navigation panel. She leaned around the far side and landed a shot on the Trooper before ducking back. An immediate spray of blaster fire boiled the deck plating where she'd been kneeling a moment ago. "What's the plan?" Fennec asked breathlessly.

"They've remotely locked us in—somehow," Bo added with a mutter. "We need to pry the doors open. Koska!"

The woman was still jumping around, keeping the Dark Trooper's attention away from Fennec and Dune as much as possible. Its shiny black hull made it difficult to tell if their shots were doing anything, but it sure as hell wasn't acting like it; boiling red plasma would burst against its surface, then fade to a matte carbon. The flashing of blaster fire reflected against its shiny surface, and the more shots they landed, the less reflective it got—and the harder it was to see in the pitch black room.

Bo peeked around the other side of the nav panel and fired at the Trooper. "Koska!" she yelled again.

"Bo!"

"Can you get to its back?"

"Not without hel—"

Her words cut off with a terrible scream. Bo activated her lamp and swept the Trooper; it had gotten a hold of Koska's leg, its fist tightening hard enough to snap the bone in her thigh. It pivoted again, swinging her like a ragdoll, and threw her into the starboard side nav panel.

The panel shattered in a spray of glass. Dune was forced to flee from its cover in a roll, and the Trooper's gun swivelled in her direction. Fennec opened fire again to distract it, and Bo ducked away, crouch-walking back to the central command panel. The console was belching sparks, and a few pinged off her helmet and pauldrons as she passed around it. She landed shots on the Trooper where possible, but she kept steady towards Koska, who was lying limp on the far side of the room.

"Koska…." Bo ducked towards her, wincing at what she found. Her left leg was a grisly mess, bent at the thigh at a horrific angle. Koska was struggling to sit up on an elbow, her pistol still clutched desperately in her grip.

"Bo," Koska rasped when she saw her, her voice shaky. "The charge—"

"It's primed?"

"Yes." She fumbled for the pouch, and Bo grabbed it. "I'm sorry, I can't—"

"It's okay," she hushed, and squeezed the woman's bicep. "It's alright."

Bo glanced back at the Trooper. It was focusing its fire on Fennec and Dune; the former had retreated to the sputtering main command console, and Dune was crouched by the door, using debris from the nav panel as meagre cover. If they held their positions for the next sixty seconds, they'd be lucky.

Bo turned back. "Koska—"

"Tell me what you need," she said roughly.

"Your jetpack."

Her helmet cocked for a moment in confusion, but she nodded nonetheless. Koska rolled on her side, grabbing Bo's arm for support and crying out at the movement. Bo reached behind her and unlatched the jetpack from her backplate, and then settled Koska back down slowly on the deck.

"The detonator is linked to your vambrace?"

"Yes. I can—"

"Activate your jetpack when I tell you to," Bo said quickly, laying it down on the deck. She pulled out the breaching charge from the satchel, peeled off the adhesive tape on both sides, and stuck one end of it to the jetpack. "And then blow that thing apart."

Koska nodded. Bo stood up with the jetpack in hand, looking to the Trooper.

"I'll cover you," Koska said roughly, holding up her pistol. "Best I can."

The Trooper was in the process of cornering Fennec and Dune. They were both behind the starboard panel now, hiding under what cover they could. Bo jumped around the panel debris with a burst from her own jetpack.

"Keep it occupied!" she called to them both, and heard a hysterical not-laugh from Dune.

"Fuck you, keep it occupied!" The woman spat back. "Help us!"

The bridge was not a particularly large room. It made maneuvering with a jetpack difficult, but it was faster than running, and Bo was out of time.

She rocketed straight at the Trooper's back, which was still turned away from her, facing Fennec and Dune. She slammed into its steel hull, fumbled with Koska's pack, and then used the other adhesive side of the charge to stick it in between the Trooper's shoulder panels.

A mechanical screech that almost sounded surprised came from the Dark Trooper—maybe it hadn't expected someone to get so close to it. Bo smiled and dropped immediately to the deck in a low crouch, rolling back towards the bridge door and out of its reach. It swivelled around furiously, its hateful crimson eyes glaring at her as the hand not occupied by a gun tried to reach over its shoulder for the pack.

But most importantly, it was facing her now.

"Koska!" Bo screamed. A second later, the jetpack activated, and the droid began rocketing in her direction.

Bo dove port side. The Trooper slammed into the bridge door as the jetpack forced it forward at full blast. The jets on its feet flared to life in an attempt to course correct itself, scorching the deck.

She glanced back at Koska. "Blow it!"

All of them flew back from the force of the blast. Bo slammed into a far console, Koska cried out and tried to duck away from the shattered glass flying around the bridge, and distantly, Bo heard Dune and Fennec yell in surprise and pain as they were flung away.

The explosion was so loud her ears popped, and for a moment the bridge ignited in a brilliant white light. The breaching charges weren't supposed to give off that kind of flare or concussive force, but they also weren't supposed to be attached to the engine of an Imperial Dark Trooper. Dune's warning about it blowing out the deck rang in her head, but it was too late to worry about that now.

Bo heard the Trooper scream, burst apart, and die against the door, and then the bridge went completely black.

* * *

"Din Djarin."

His pulse pounded hard in his ears, echoing dully inside his helmet. The cell was larger than he anticipated; it was meant to hold men, not infants. In the center, in front of the lone bench, stood Gideon. He held the Darksaber in his hand, angled casually over the—

The kid.

Din's breath caught in his throat. The kid was pale, and small, and not conscious. Tiny cuffs bound his hands in front of him, and his head was tipped forward, asleep where he sat. There was something wrong with him. The colouring of his skin was off—it was more grey than green, and wiry veins stood out beneath the translucent pallor.

His helmet swivelled to Gideon.

"Give him to me."

"He's fine where he is," Gideon replied, almost soothingly, and smiled. The Darksaber crackled where it hung, and the Moff's hand was steady. Din's shook. "Set your pistol down and kick it over to me."

Din glanced at the kid again. He looked more slight than he remembered him being, and they hadn't been apart long. Had he lost weight?

"Is he alive?"

"Oh, yes. Now, your pistol. I won't ask again."

"I'm not fighting you," Din replied, but he knelt down to set his blaster on the deck, and then stood up to kick it towards Gideon. "Just give me the kid."

Gideon's brow flicked upwards. His boot lifted to stop the blaster from twirling on the deck, pressing hard on the barrel. "In exchange for…?"

"I let you live."

"You just said you won't fight me."

"I won't. But I will kill you."

"Ah." Gideon tipped his head. "And how will you manage that?"

His heart was hammering in his chest. The kid wasn't moving. He looked so pale—

"Din," Gideon said again, pulling his attention back to the Moff. The man was smiling, his expression kind. "I see you're exhausted. I know how much he means to you."

"What's wrong with him?"

"He's been quite combative," Gideon said, glancing down at the kid. "And bad at following instructions. Takes after his father that way. But he'll be fine. He just needs someone to look after him. And you've put me in a tight spot."

His throat ached; his jaw clenched. "I don't care about anything else," he whispered. "Just him."

"Oh, I'm aware. Unfortunately, your boarding party has other priorities. Bo-Katan continues to be a thorn in my side." He rotated his hand at the wrist, and the Darksaber swayed in the air, crackling faintly. "She's still very upset I have this, and I imagine she's quite furious about the fact that I'm not on the bridge."

"I can—" Din swallowed. "I can escort you to safety."

Gideon's brow raised in interest. The saber stopped swaying in the air, and Din pressed on. "We've taken control of your ship," he continued. "Bo-Katan wants to kill you; the others want to hand you over to the New Republic. I can lead you to the launch bay, to your ship. I'll protect you. You have my word."

"And what good will that do me?"

"Imperial reinforcements are on their way." He tried not to let the words come out like a question, though he wasn't sure how true that was. The Empire might be gone, but what remained was strong—he just hoped they were strong enough for this offer to be compelling. "I'm sure they'll pick you up."

"I see." Gideon let out a sigh, like he was lamenting something. "And you think I want to escape?"

Din froze at that. Gideon smiled. "It's a gracious offer, what you're proposing. But you've misjudged the situation. My presence here isn't some desperate gambit for survival. You've overestimated your control over my cruiser."

As if timed precisely for their conversation, a low boom overhead rocked the ship, hard enough that the bulkheads creaked around them. He didn't dare look away, but Gideon allowed himself to scan the ceiling, unhurried and at ease. "I think we just heard your friends die. I'm afraid you're on your own now."

Din's fists clenched at his sides. There was no time to think about Cara, or Fennec, or even Bo-Katan and Koska. If they were dead, then he would deal with it—but not right now.

He allowed himself to look at the kid one more time, then locked eyes with Gideon. "Then what do you want?" he hissed.

"I want to kill you," Gideon replied calmly. "I destroyed your covert. I destroyed your ship. All that's left is you. You and your shiny shell." He nodded to the kid without breaking eye contact. "Besides which, I can't allow him to leave. He's too valuable."

"You won't win in a fight," Din told him. "Not against a Mandalorian."

"That was true for much of my life," Gideon agreed. "But I've eliminated that weakness in myself. And you, my friend—you are not at your best, are you?" The saber swung in the air again, like a toy being admired. "Out of your mind with fear for the boy, exhausted beyond what you can tolerate. You think you hide it well, but I see you."

Din clenched his teeth. The spear hung heavily by his shoulder, the steel nearly singing in anticipation. He knew he was faster than Gideon, but he wasn't about to draw yet. Not until he'd exhausted every other option.

"You've beaten me," Din said to him, the words like acid in his mouth. "And you won't see me again after this, I promise. Just—just give me the kid."

"When the Emperor gave me the task of destroying Mandalore, I relished the opportunity," Gideon murmured, as if he hadn't heard him. He was watching the sword sway fondly through the air. "It was a chance to prove what I knew to be true already—that your people, for all their might, would submit to Imperial rule. I have no shame in admitting the task was far more difficult than anticipated. Mandalorians are good at surviving, and you were all capable of enduring humiliations that had not even occurred to me." He glanced at Din with a smile. "The sewers? A genius adaptation. I hadn't imagined you would subject yourselves to such lows, and yet there you were, hiding in plain sight. I simply hadn't considered looking under my feet." The sword swung in his direction. "But I have that perspective now. And you… you have my gratitude for helping me see the world as your people do."

He didn't dare reach for the spear. Instead he looked at the kid again, pale and small, and choked back his anger. "Please," he whispered then, unable to do anything else. "You want me to beg for him? I'll do it."

"That would be entertaining," Gideon said. "But no. I want you to die."

The Moff's other hand raised in the air, palm out, and Din flew backwards out of the cell.

* * *

The air on the bridge was thick with smoke. Bo struggled to her feet, coughing, and reactivated the flashlight at the end of her pistol, swinging it towards the door.

The beam swept the mangled corpse of the Dark Trooper; the breaching charge had blown straight through its chest, leaving it a charred and broken mess on the deck. The explosion had also left a significant dent in the airlock door—wide enough that light seeped through the bulging, uneven seam.

"Fennec," she rasped, coughing again. "Dune?"

"Alive," Dune croaked in the gloom, but she sounded far away. "Both of us. The windows—"

Bo turned to look at the viewport. A messy latticework of cracks webbed across its transparent surface. She realised belatedly that the ringing sound she heard wasn't just coming from her ears; the depressurisation warning was blaring overhead. Outside the windows, a hiss of smoke was venting out into space. They had a few minutes, maybe, before the windows gave way and killed them all.

"Fuck! _Fuck!"_ She kicked at the nearest console and heard the metal cave beneath the steel toe of her boot. This could not be happening. She needed the bridge entact. Without it, the cruiser was worthless.

Bo pointed her light in the direction Dune's voice had come from—the command console. "Can we get the safety shutters down?"

Dune shook her head and coughed. "Terminal's fucked."

Bo closed her eyes, thinking. Maybe this wasn't the end, not yet. She reminded herself that someone had killed the lights and locked them in remotely—perhaps there _was_ a way to operate the ship without the bridge. All they needed was to find out where the officers left aboard were hiding.

Fennec was staggering towards the door, and her voice brought her out of her thoughts. "We need to get this open. Is Koska alive?"

"Incapacitated," she reported, and then turned to make sure she was right. The woman had a pulse, but she'd fallen unconscious. "Everyone to the door. We'll pry it open."

They shoved the body of the Dark Trooper out of the way, but Dune grabbed one of the steel poles from its arms and passed it to Fennec. Bo fished around for another one, and they began to wedge apart the doors.

"Where to—" Dune grunted, her face scrunched in effort as she pulled on her bar, "—next?"

"Medbay," Bo said in a clipped tone. "Keep—pushing."

"We'll have to blast its doors open, too," Fennec grunted. "And we can't close these again. If the bridge depressurises—"

The door groaned from the strain. The seam of light grew thicker as the scorched and dented airlock bent to accommodate for the strain. "Then we'll figure—it—out—"

The high-pitched alarm continued to whine. All three of them grew silent as they worked furiously to pry the doors apart. She didn't dare look back at the viewport, or Koska, or anything else. All that mattered was the door. Her arms burned from the effort of prying it loose.

The seam continued to widen, its mouth opening far enough to fit a leg through, then a shoulder, then an entire body. She tossed her own pole down and nodded to Fennec. "Shove through," she ordered. "We'll have to carry Koska."

To both Fennec and Dune's credit, neither of them complained. There was no discussion of poor odds, no defeatist talk about how badly the plan was going. All they did was push forward with grim resolve.

Dune helped her haul Koska's unconscious body to the dented opening in the door. If they had more time, or more people, she'd retrieve whatever beskar from the jetpack remained in the scrap heap and return it to Koska, but they couldn't afford the extra weight. She whispered a silent thank you to it instead, mourning its loss for a moment, and then shoved it out of her mind.

It was a struggle, but they managed to pass Koska through the door. Fennec set her down against a hallway bulkhead, and then immediately pulled out her weapon and swept the corridor as Dune and Bo stepped through the opening.

"Still clear," Fennec reported. "It's a ghost ship."

"Not quite." Bo stalked over to the medbay doors, which still had a charge attached to it, and banged her fist against the steel. "Listen up, people! I know you're in there! If you don't open this door, I'm blasting it open, and then you'll all be sucked through the hole in the bridge!"

"There's an officer's room just down that hall," Fennec said quietly behind them. "We can fall back there if need be."

"You got a key for it?" Dune asked.

"No," she lamented. "I gave the code cylinder to Mando."

"Could blow that door open, too, while we're at it," Dune muttered. She glanced at Bo. "Any response?"

Bo held up a hand to quiet them and listened at the door. It was difficult to hear anything; the steel was several inches thick, meant to be airtight. She wondered if the officers on the other side had even heard her.

" _What do you want?"_ she heard then, above her. Bo looked up and found a small audio transmitter nestled in the ceiling.

"I want this ship," she replied. "And good news for you, my friend is in a merciful mood. We'll keep you alive if you open this door."

Static crackled over the receiver. She glanced at Dune, and saw that the woman's right arm was bleeding heavily. She'd taken a blaster round to the bicep, and was favouring her gun in her other hand. Also not good.

" _What guarantee do we have?"_ the man over the receiver asked.

"My word," she replied. "I'm sure you've heard of Mandalorian vows. They aren't broken easily." She wanted to ask if Gideon was in there, but didn't. Not yet. Showing too much of her hand could go badly, and these people didn't necessarily know who she was.

There was a deep rending sound that came from behind the bridge doors. She heard the glass of the viewport bend, and her heart began to thunder.

"Katan!" Dune insisted, now helping Fennec pick up Koska. "Do something!"

"Make your choice now!" Bo barked. "Open up or get blown up with me!"

" _Deactivate the charge!"_

"Unlock the door first! You have five seconds!"

Another pause of silence that felt far too long, and then she heard the internal locking mechanism thud open. Quickly, Bo reached for the breaching charge and disengaged the trigger, then peeled it off the door. "I can blow this thing at any time!" she yelled, hearing another deeply troubling groan from the bridge. "Now open the fucking door—"

There was a hiss, and then the doors slid apart. Bo dove inside with the charge, and Fennec and Dune quickly followed after, dragging Koska by the arms. The medbay doors shut behind them immediately, and she turned to face the room.

She counted four officers, two Stormtroopers, and three other people with medical designations on the sleeve of their coats. Most of them were cowering behind medical equipment and input consoles—even the officers looked shaken. There was nobody else in the room with them.

On the other side of the door she heard an explosive rush of air as the bridge finally blew out. Fennec and Dune exchanged a look, and between them, Koska coughed wetly.

Bo aimed one of her pistols at the officers. "Where is Moff Gideon?"

* * *

His jetpack slammed into the far bulkhead of the corridor outside the cell. The blast had felt exactly like the energy field on Tython—unyielding and solid, as if the air itself had locked together and become steel.

He collapsed to the deck on his hands and knees, groaning. In his periphery he saw Gideon step out of the kid's cell, and looked up to find him grinning.

"You feel it?" he asked calmly, but there was an undercurrent of effort to his words. "It's real. The Jedi used to hoard this knowledge to themselves. They told everyone it was a fluke of good birth. It's why they fell. This power should go to those deserving of it." The Darksaber's blade sang in the air as the Moff swung it forwards, angled down at Din. "And your child did not earn the gifts it possesses."

He got to his feet with a grunt. Gideon allowed him to stand before raising his hand again; this time, Din was swept to the side, landing hard on his pauldron and skidding across the floor. The spear clanged against the deck, and somewhere far above them, the ship rocked with another explosion too distant to hear, but powerful enough to feel.

"Your companions put up a good fight," Gideon continued, walking towards him. Din rolled to his knees and began to stand up again. "They may have even outlived the surprise I left for them."

He finally reached for the spear. It sang as it flew from the holster, and the steel was true in his grip. The Moff paused at the draw, his eyes following the length of the spear, before flicking up to Din's visor.

"You still want to fight me?"

"Last chance to give me the kid," he said, a bit breathlessly, and shifted to put his weight on his back foot.

Gideon did the same—and Din recognised the stance. It was part of a Mandalorian fighting set. "I admire your tenacity."

Gideon lunged forward with the saber. Din brought up the spear to block it, and part of him was surprised that the steel bore the heat and might of the crackling blade so well. The way his day had been going, this was a stroke of extraordinary good fortune.

With a flick he dislodged the saber from the spear, and the sword swung wide, striking a bulkhead panel. Sparks flew; smoke coiled from the wall and thickened the air. The scent reminded him of the Armourer's forge.

Din brought the end of the spear up, intending to strike Gideon, and was blown back again with a shove from the Moff's hand, sailing through the air and landing heavily on his back. The impact jarred his spine and shoulders, and his ears rang.

"You—are good!" Gideon said with a breathless laugh. "And have trained well. The archives on Mandalore were very instructive. I see now why you've accrued such renown for yourself."

Gideon continued to talk while Din struggled to his feet. The blows took a toll on his body beyond the simple physical impact—there was something deeply wrong with whatever force Gideon was using. There was a sickness to it that ate at his gut and made the inside of his skull heat up. Even the air was different; it flowed around him like fluid, and he could feel tendrils of it licking at the rim of his helmet.

It was, also, taxing Gideon; his face was already shiny with sweat, and he seemed to have trouble catching his breath. Din watched the man approach slowly as he got to his feet again, spear braced at the ready in front of him.

"... yet you continue to stand." The Darksaber swung in the air, the black blade crackling. "I'll have to make this quick."

Din lunged this time, spear tip out, and Gideon swung to bat it aside. Din struck again, slamming the side of the staff against the Moff's arm guard, and then again to disarm him. Gideon seemed to have some training, but not enough—not more than him. Din had killed men who had never fought for their life before. Rich and comfortable, delegating that messy duty to those under them. Gideon was not such a man. He had killed others before, and done so with his own hand.

But Din was better at it. He always was.

He struck the Moff once, twice, with the flat of the staff, first his shoulder, then his side. He had to take a step back to brace for the incoming swing of the Darksaber, holding up a forearm so that his vambrace took the impact. The horrific bruise he'd gotten days earlier, fighting on the mining convoy in shitty Stormtrooper armour, now burned from the blunt force of the blade.

Gideon seemed to notice. "You've gotten weaker since we last met," he said, teeth bared. There was something wrong with his eyes; they flickered a sick and putrid yellow. "Losing takes its toll after a while, once you've done it— _enough!"_

This time, Gideon's open palm connected with Din's ribs. He flew upwards, slamming into the ceiling, and then fell to the deck. Beskar screeched as it skid across steel. The spear was still in his grip, but Gideon's boot came down hard on his hand until his fingers seized.

"Let go of that, please," he said calmly, and then kicked it out of reach when Din's fingers loosened. "Thank you."

The force of the blow to his side had squeezed all the air from his lungs. He couldn't reply, or say anything, or even draw in breath, and he struggled for a single gulp of air as he struggled to get his hands and feet under him.

It hurt. All of him hurt. The effort it took just to brace his palm against the deck….

"I kept your file," Gideon said, standing there, waiting. He seemed to be in no particular hurry to deliver the final blow—it was the only reason Din was still alive. "From the registers on Mandalore. You were so young when your parents died. Do you remember their names? Would you like me to tell you what they were?"

A faint crackling sound echoed inside his helmet as his visor ground against the dirt on the deck. He needed to stand up, and he needed a weapon. Din leaned on his good arm, and reached down, towards his boot. His fingers fumbled for the hilt of his knife—it was the only weapon left to him.

"Valéria was your mother's," Gideon said softly, and Din squeezed his eyes closed. He had the hilt of the knife in his grasp, and slid it carefully from the sheath in his boot. "And your father's—"

Gideon was apparently done waiting; Din felt his body drag upwards, not of his own volition, and with a grip on his throat he could not bat away.

Gideon's free hand was shaking in the air, his fingers locked in a rictus of effort as Din hung, suspended, in front of him.

The Moff smiled tensely. His eyes were a deep gold now, flickering. "Well, perhaps I'll keep that part a secret. But I would like one more thing from you."

He twisted the Darksaber in his hand until the point was pressed against Din's belly, just beneath his breastplate. His free hand yanked Din forward, and the blade sank deep into his abdomen.

His mouth opened, but no sound escaped. The pain was unimaginable. The saber was as sharp as any steel blade, but it burned all the way through, and he could do nothing but struggle as Gideon held him close. When the saber pierced through the other side of his body, he heard the splash of sizzling blood hit the deck.

"It's the only thing you've kept hidden from me," Gideon said quietly. They were close enough together now that his breath fogged Din's visor. "I would like to see your face."

The tendrils in the air coiled around the rim of his helmet. He felt the weight of it slowly lift away from his face, and his head jerked weakly in a vain attempt to buck free. One hand was locked around Gideon's wrist where he held the Darksaber against his abdomen, and the other was still clutching his own knife. But his limbs were too heavy to move, immobilised and weighed down by the incapacitating agony of the saber in his gut.

His helmet slid off his head, clanging hard against the deck where it fell. A cool rush of air hit the hot, sweaty skin of his face, and he met the Moff's gaze, unobstructed by his visor.

"You have your father's eyes," Gideon whispered, like he was telling him a secret. "Very good." He jerked his hand, pressing the hilt of the saber hard into Din's belly, and a choked hiss of air finally escaped him. "I want to see the light go out of them."

Gideon was trembling with the effort of holding him up and keeping the Darksaber pressed into his stomach. Blood leaked from the Moff's nose, and the whites of his eyes grew veined. The yellow in them was so intense now they practically glowed, lit by some fevered inner warmth.

The knife in Din's grip was solid and familiar. His hands were finally steady.

"You first," he choked out, and buried the blade to the hilt in Gideon's throat.

* * *

The stab was messy. It cut clean through Gideon's artery, spraying blood everywhere—and locked this close together, it coated Din's face.

He did not look away from Gideon. He gritted his teeth and commanded his body to stay standing, even as the Darksaber shrank back into its hilt, even as Gideon, now choking on his own blood, toppled forward into him.

The air around them thinned; the tendrils receded, vanishing until all that was left in the corridor was recycled oxygen. The hand Gideon had been using to hold Din aloft now swiped ineffectually at the blade stuck in his throat—the other hand dropped the Darksaber with a clatter before grabbing onto Din's arm.

Gideon died quickly. The sick gold faded from his eyes, sinking back into the muted, human brown they'd been before. Din could barely stand under his own power; supporting Gideon's weight, too, buckled his knees. He stood long enough to watch the man die, and then he could stand no longer.

They fell heavily to the ground. Din tried to stumble away, and half-succeeded; Gideon slumped against the wall beside him, but their legs were tangled together where they fell. His jetpack hit the deck, steel against steel, and he cried out as the hole in his abdomen took the impact.

There was even more blood on the floor. Coming out of him, still spraying out of Gideon, pooling across the polished steel. It smeared the deck where they'd both stood, messy half-formed boot prints and peripheral imprints of clothing. His cloak was soaked through, squelching in a sopping mess underneath him.

He stared up at the ceiling, watching the lights strobe as the distress siren blared. One of his hands felt upwards to his stomach, touching the scorched fabric and padding around the wound. The material was slimy with blood, and he could feel it coating his gloves as it spilled out of him. The Darksaber had burned his flesh, inside and out, but a cut that deep couldn't be fully cauterised. The sword had come clean out the other side of him, too, probably destroying a kidney.

He couldn't stay on his back. His jetpack dug into his spine, putting enough pressure on the wound that it made spots wink in his vision. His side, then—his good side. He coughed out breath and turned to roll.

His body was so heavy; everything was so heavy. Gideon's corpse, half-lying on him, useless and limp, jostled against him as he struggled to roll away. Everything was so heavy, and he had to get up.

The cell door was still open from their fight. His vision was too sharp, noticing all the things that could not help him. The scorch marks on the bulkheads left by Gideon's careless slashing; the strobing lights overhead that flashed in concert with its Imperial klaxon; the troopers he'd killed, lying dead in shiny white armour on the deck. It was all committed to meticulous memory, and it all meant nothing.

Then he saw his helmet. It laid on its side, the mouth of it turned away. His own visor stared back at him, black and sharp. He could probably reach it if he tried; he could die with it on, to grant his corpse some measure of privacy when his friends found him.

Din looked back at the cell, swallowing around the bitter taste of acid in his mouth. He had to get through that door first. The kid was in there, and then… then he needed to call Cara. He would die here, but she could take care of the rest.

Din closed his eyes and pressed his cheek to the cold steel of the deck. Already he could feel himself fading. Every movement was sluggish; the hand reaching for his belt was surely made of solid iron. He needed to get a hold of his comlink and contact someone—anyone—so they could come grab the kid. He needed to….

The sound of soft cooing narrowed his focus, sharpening to a fine point. Din opened his eyes and found the kid, now awake, struggling towards him.

"Hey," Din gasped, and felt his skin peel away from the deck with sticky blood as he spoke. "Hey—buddy."

The kid looked so miserably small. He had made it across the threshold of the cell door, waddling awkwardly with his hands still bound in front of him. His skin was too pale, his eyes too glassy. Even over the sound of his own harsh breathing, Din could hear his exhales coming out too sharply.

"Don't—don't step in the blood," he whispered, and reached out for him. It made his stomach burn—it made all of him burn—but he kept his arm extended out for the kid to grasp. "Walk around."

The kid didn't listen—he never listened—and the bottom of his jumper smeared with black and crimson as he shuffled closer. It seemed to take a great effort for him to hold his hands up high enough to grab one of Din's fingers, and he huffed out a breath when his claws curled around the leather of Din's glove.

Din swallowed. "Let me get… get your cuffs off. It's alright." His over hand slid across the ground, smearing blood, and felt up shakily to the kid's cuffs. He paused then, teeth clenching, as a lance of pain shot through the wound in his abdomen, so white-hot it stole his breath away.

The kid whined. He looked terrible. Under the harsh fluorescent lighting of the hallway, his skin was almost grey, the insides of his drooping ears a dull, faded pink.

"It's okay," Din repeated, knowing that wasn't true. He fumbled for the clasp of the binders. "You're okay…."

The kid's eyes never left his face, wide and afraid. Air bubbled wetly up Din's throat as he fiddled with the cuffs. The metal was cheap and thin, and the inner glow of the binders dulled as blood coated them. There was so much blood….

The clasp finally unlatched, and the shackles clinked to the ground. He forced a smile and met the kid's eyes. "There," he whispered, and watched him toddle closer. At first he thought the kid was moving to his chest, looking for comfort, but he was waddling toward Din's midsection, hands outstretched with desperate intent.

A jolt of cold terror shot through him, granting him a rare moment of lucidity. "No," he whispered, and pushed the kid away with a hand on his tiny belly. "No, no, kid. You can't. You're not strong enough."

The kid pushed back, and for a moment the air solidified again; it was a weak echo of that same force Gideon had used, but it lacked all sickness or heat. It was gentle, and cool, and soothing.

"Kid, don't—"

His large, glassy eyes were fixed on the hideous wound in Din's side, spilling blood out onto the deck. The ends of his jumper were soaked through with crimson now, and it was beginning to creep up the fabric. He whined, batting Din's hand away while trying to move closer.

"Listen—listen to me," he rasped, and the intensity in his voice made the kid go still and look at him. "I know you… understand me."

He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, gathering his thoughts. It was so difficult to focus. He could feel his body shutting down, and he knew he was dying. It was a sensation he wasn't entirely unused to, but he'd never been this close before. There was no coming back from this, and the kid couldn't be here when it happened. He couldn't do that to him—he couldn't put him through that.

"I'm so… sorry," he began, his words coming out stilted. He opened his eyes, and found the kid watching him, his expression small and miserable. "I'm so sorry." Din swallowed. "You need to go… with Cara. I'm going to call her, and you're gonna… you're gonna go with her. You don't need to be afraid," he whispered, forcing a smile. "I—"

His throat closed up. The kid's tiny form blurred as tears filled his eyes. He swallowed again, trying to force the lump in his throat down. "I love you, kid," Din breathed, and felt his little fingers grasp onto the hand he still had braced against the kid's body. "You're the best thing that's ever—ever happened to me."

The kid whined again. It was unlike any sound he'd made before—it was full of grief, like he understood what was happening.

Of course he did, Din thought. He'd understood too, when he was a boy.

Hot tears tracked down his face, flicking to the deck. The kid reached for him again, and this time Din didn't stop him. Slowly, he waddled closer, hands outstretched until they pressed gently against Din's cheek. His fingers were cool, and his claws dug softly into his clammy skin.

"Hey, pal," he murmured, and curled his arm inwards, pressing his hand against the kid's back. "I'm sorry…."

This close up, he could see bruises on the kid's skin. He looked even more frail than he had in the cell; whatever Gideon had done to him, it had pushed him to his limits.

He expected a rush of anger to flush his system, but found serenity in its place. He frowned. It hadn't come from within; the calm that washed over him was unlike anything he'd felt before. The ringing in his head had stopped, too, like all the sound inside his skull had been sucked out into the vacuum of space.

In its place, he heard a soft, insistent _I WILL HELP._

He glanced up at the kid's face. Scrunched, upset, but stalwart. He'd seen the same expression on his face when he'd held up the Mudhorn, or pulled the ball from Din's hand, or healed Greef. And he knew, somehow, that the voice he'd heard had come from the kid. The words had been strangely familiar, like he'd listened to them all his life, but hadn't noticed until now.

"No," he rasped, feeling himself fading. He was too weak to even feel panic anymore. "You can't…."

Another wave of calm washed over him, more intense than before. He couldn't struggle against it even if he wanted to, and its tide quickly pulled him under.

The tiny outline of the kid, still blurred from tears, disappeared from sight as his eyes fell closed.


	2. ACT II

Cara was running out of patience and energy. She did her best to tune out Katan arguing with the officers and the doctors, focusing instead on grabbing a tourniquet for her arm and a brace for Koska's leg. Fennec helped her root around in the supply cupboards, her face pinched with a growing dread that Cara felt, too.

The plan was fucked. Their encounter with the Dark Trooper on the bridge had probably been a mission-killing complication. Every second they wasted trapped in here was an extra second that reinforcements had to arrive; and however good Fett was at evading TIE fighters, he wouldn't stand a chance against a platoon of Dark Troopers and whatever else was coming for them.

She needed to get a hold of Djarin, find out how he was faring. He hadn't contacted her yet, which was either a very good—or very bad—sign.

"—remote access in here?" Katan was demanding, sweeping the barrel of her pistol over an officer again, who shrank away at how aggressive she was being.

"We set it up beforehand! Long before you got here. I don't know how it works."

"Long before?" she hissed. "Were you anticipating someone would try to board the cruiser?"

"Well… yes," the man said in bewilderment, clearly assuming she knew that already. "You sent us a message saying as much."

Bo-Katan's owl-like visor turned in Cara's direction. Although her face was obscured, her fury was readily apparent. "You _what?"_

"Don't start with me. It wasn't my idea." Fennec handed her a splint for Koska's leg, and she walked over to the other, much less combative, Mandalorian.

Katan wasn't done. "Do you people know how surprise attacks work? Or how to conduct a boarding action? Or how to do _anything—"_

"It wasn't my idea! Yell at Dj—at Mando." She turned back to Koska and touched the woman's arm, speaking in a much quieter tone. "You good if I set your leg?"

Koska's helmet bobbed up and down in a nod. "Go for it," she muttered, voice strained with pain.

"I should do that," Fennec offered, just behind Cara's shoulder. "You need your arm looked at."

"I'll live." She glanced over at Katan, who was now practically shaking with rage. "Well? Stop complaining! Find us a way out of here."

"We wouldn't _be_ in this position had you not announced _to the enemy_ that we would be coming," Katan hissed.

One of the Stormtroopers took advantage of the distraction and aimed a shot at Bo. Her beskar deflected the blaster round easily, and the man won a bolt in the chest for his bravery. He fell forward, slamming into a gurney, before falling dead to the floor. For a moment, the medbay was entirely silent.

"Any other brave warriors wanna try that next?" Katan asked the crowd of Imps. They all shook their heads in a unanimous and emphatic _no,_ and she let out a string of harsh words in Mando'a. Cara had been around Mandalorians long enough by now to pick out a few choice curses, and then Katan returned to the conversation at hand.

"You have full bridge controls accessible in this room?" she asked. As she spoke, Fennec knelt down beside Cara and gently—but firmly—pushed her out of the way.

"I'll do this," she said quietly, giving Cara a stern look. "Clean and bind your arm. I left a kit on the counter by the cabinets."

Cara sat back on her heels. Her hands were sweaty in her gloves, and the adrenaline was finally fading from her system. In its place was a throbbing, burning ache that made her arm stiff and her head pound. "Yeah," she muttered. "Sure, okay. Thanks."

"No problem. Now get out of my way."

She stood up with a snort and left Fennec to tend to Koska, walking wearily over to the supply cabinets. Hell, she was tired.

In the meantime, Katan was strong-arming her way into the crowd of Imps, demanding one of the officers show her the master control panel. Whatever else Cara had to say about the woman—and she had a _lot_ of things to say—she couldn't deny that Bo-Katan knew how to command a room. And maybe it was just the exhaustion talking, but despite seeing that most of the Imperial crew was armed, Cara wasn't particularly concerned that they'd start shooting at them anytime soon. Their victory over the Dark Trooper had been narrow, but it was a victory nonetheless, and these people were clearly hesitant to try anything with a fireteam capable of defeating one of them.

"Good," she heard Bo-Katan say as Cara began to disinfect her arm with a patch she'd doused in rubbing alcohol. She was standing over one of the officers seated in a chair in front of the large console that dominated the back wall of the medical bay, partitioned from the beds and cabinets by a few glass panels. "Now, tell me how we get out of here."

"Um—"

"What's your name, kid?" Katan pressed the barrel of her pistol against the officer's nameplate and tilted her helmet. "Gabbon?"

"Yes, uh, ma'am."

"Well, Gabbon, you need to tell me where your Moff is, and you need to show me how we get to him."

Cara watched the other crew. The lone Stormtrooper was hiding off in the corner, making himself as small and inconspicuous as possible. The three other officers were hovering warily around the main terminal at the back of the room, but they gave Bo-Katan a very wide berth. The small team of medical staff were similarly staying out of everyone's way, and Cara tried to take her mind off the wound in her arm by reading their insignia patches. One of the meds was a biologist—a scientist, then, not really a doctor. Another was some residence kid, apparently being trained in the noble art of torturing children for the Empire. The third, a woman with blond hair pulled back in a harsh bun, was marked as a medical professional. She would be the one to keep alive, should they have to cull the herd. Cara made a mental note to tell Katan about it.

"I don't know where is—I don't!" Gabbon held up his hands as Katan aimed her pistol at his face. "I swear I don't! He just told us to hide in here and then left."

"The brig, most likely," Koska said from her spot on the floor, making Bo turn to look at her. "That's my guess. Or he jumped ship."

Katan's helmet tilted for a moment as she thought. "I don't think he'd run away. That's not his style. But it's all the more reason for us to be on our way." She turned back and aimed the gun at the kid again. "Show us a secure path to get there, and I'll let you people live."

"You vented the bridge and the adjoining hallway," another officer interjected. This one was a little older, more experienced. His voice was steady when he spoke. "You need to wait for the safety shutters to close and the area to repressurise."

"I know you people always have back doors and secondary exits," Katan shot back. She was holding two pistols; the other swung in the older officer's direction. "I've raided more Imperial craft than you've served on, you little worm."

"Then why don't you find an exit yourself—"

She shot him in the head. He fell heavily to the deck, close to where the trooper had dropped. The other officers gasped and cowered away from her, hands held up, palms out, in a show of surrender.

"Anyone else?" she asked, helmet swivelling to look at the other Stormtrooper and the medical staff. When none of them said anything, she turned back to Gabbon. "Now show me how to get out of this fucking room."

* * *

Bo watched Gabbon tremble in his seat as he pulled up a layout of the cruiser. This one was different from the one Mando had stolen—it was far more detailed, highlighting maintenance hallways and access hatches that hadn't been present before. He hastily scaled the layout up until it only displayed the medical bay, and pointed to the vents in the port side bow corner of the room.

"Maintenance access is here," he said, his words coming out a little too quickly. "It'll probably be, uh, a tight fit in your armour, but you should be able to follow it to the other side of the breached hallway. Emergency protocols have sealed off this section of the ship—"

She stopped paying attention to him and turned to look at the others. Koska was awake—barely—and her leg was being tended to by Fennec; Cara was standing by a row of supply cabinets while she wrapped up her arm. It wasn't the worst position a fireteam under her command had ever been in, but it certainly wasn't the best, either.

Bo turned back to Gabbon. "Do you have a security feed here?"

He frowned at her, mouth hanging open slightly as he paused mid-sentence with whatever he'd been saying. "Um, yes, one—"

"You have video access to the lower decks?"

"Shouldn't we be worried about getting out of here first?" Cara said behind her, and both Bo and Gabbon glanced back at her. Dune raised a brow. "Reinforcements will be showing up any time now."

"I still need confirmation that Gideon is on this ship," Bo shot back coolly.

"And if he isn't?"

"Then we hunt him down."

"And how the hell are we going to do that?" Cara asked. The irritation and the weariness from the fight was plain in her voice. "The bridge is vented."

"We have remote control of the ship here," she said, and turned to Gabbon. "You can navigate from this control panel, yes?"

"Well—" His eyes darted to the side, towards the two bodies on the floor. Their blaster wounds were still smoking faintly. "You killed the navigation lieutenant."

Dune snorted derisively behind her. Bo glared down at the man.

"Answer my question."

His eyelids shuttered rapidly, and then he nodded, looking back to the console in front of him. "Access to engines is green," he reported, tapping a screen to his left. "It's possible to initiate a jump from here, but—"

"But?"

"But I don't know how," he replied. "The math, it's—you have to calculate hyperspace vectors manually for random jumps. And I'm not trained in NavStat."

"Then find me the list of predetermined jump solutions," she told him, making sure the barrel of her pistol cast a long shadow over the man's shoulder. He tensed in his seat. "I know this ship has some."

This was not good. Bo had flown cruisers before, but—well, briefly. _Very_ briefly. And the computer had done the calculus for her. Using a predetermined solution would solve the math issue, but if it was from a universal bank of hyperspace vectors the Imps all had access to, it would be nothing for reinforcements to follow along.

They could also initiate a short-distance scramble-jump, but that was risky with a craft this size, and Gideon had made sure to situate his cruiser in between a number of major hyperspace lanes. The last thing they needed was to jump away from Imperial reinforcements and land directly in the path of interstellar traffic.

Bitterly, she remembered the days when she had entire platoons under her command, with people trained in this sort of thing. Relying on Imperials to do the work for her was already a risk, but she shoved that aside. It was a complication to deal with later.

The most reasonable thing right now would be to call Fett for a lift and abandon ship. But she wouldn't entertain that possibility until it was the only one left to her.

And she still had not found Gideon.

A blaring alarm ripped her from her thoughts. She glared down at the console Gabbon sat in front of. "What is it?"

"Boarding party," he reported, strangely calm now, and she saw dozens of incoming projectiles light up on the proximity reader.

"The Dark Troopers," Cara supplied, walking up to stand next to Bo. "Must be the platoon Mando vented. At least his part of the plan is going smoothly."

Bo ground her teeth and pressed her pistol into the back of Gabbon's head. "Close the hangar doors, then!"

The kid thankfully didn't talk back this time; he just did as he was told. She could feel the eyes of the other Imps on her, and she knew she was losing command of the room.

"You can't close them any faster?" Cara asked.

"I'm doing—everything I can!" Gabbon replied, his voice raising several octaves. "I can't control how fast the ship shutters itself—"

Bo leaned over his shoulder and watched the proximity reader. A few of the projectiles had disappeared, and that meant they had either been destroyed—or they'd already boarded the ship. Bo didn't need to guess which option it was.

Bo turned to the other remaining officer, a small man in his late twenties. Gideon commanded a rather green crew, but she supposed it was hard to find good help these days. "Tell me where your Moff is," she said plainly. "I won't ask again."

He held his hands up and nodded. "The brig," he said calmly. "He went to the brig, where the—the asset is being held."

"Very good." She glanced at Dune. "Can you keep this place locked down?"

A dark brow arched up her forehead. "You're not seriously going down there? Just get Mando to bring him up to the medbay."

"Gideon won't come quietly."

"Gideon isn't an idiot, either," Cara shot back. "Why the hell would he fight a Mandalorian?"

"You have no idea what he's capable of."

Dune's eyes narrowed, and her next words came out low and even. "I got a pretty good idea."

"Can we figure out an exit plan first?" Fennec interrupted, and they both turned to look at her. "We're all going to die soon if we don't get off this ship."

"I'm not leaving without the Darksaber, and I am _not_ giving this ship up to the Imps." Bo looked back at Gabbon. "Flight solutions?"

Cara scoffed. "You're gonna trust this twerp to get us out of here? After pointing a gun at his head for the last half an hour? How do you know he won't launch us into an Imperial nest?"

"Exit plan!" Fennec reminded them loudly. "Fett can't pick us up in this mess if we have Dark Troopers and Imperial ships swarming the place."

"Everyone shut up!" Bo strode to the centre of the room and made sure her visor connected with the gaze of every person in the bay. "I am going down to the brig to get Gideon. You three—" She eyed Dune, Fennec and Koska, "—will find us a path out of this system. Is that clear?"

"You're not going anywhere, sweetheart," Cara replied, and gestured to the console again. "DTs are about to start knocking on our front door."

Over Gabbon's shoulder, she watched the central screen. He'd pulled up a video feed; several Dark Troopers were pummelling their way through the airlock door that opened up to the vented bridge corridor, and a few more approached from the other direction, having climbed through the giant hole in the bridge itself.

Sweat trickled down her temple, and her breath began to fog up the inside of her visor. They were out of time.

* * *

Somehow, he woke up.

Din jerked awake with a gasp. His head pounded, and it took a moment for his vision to sharpen. The world greeted him sideways, and was far too bright; he found a door in front of him, opening up into a trapezoidal cell. Beside it, much closer, lay his helmet on the floor.

He coughed, and felt his skin pull painfully against the deck he was lying on. The smell of copper filled his nose and mouth. With a wince, he lifted his head and peeled his blood-encrusted cheek off the floor, struggling to get an elbow braced under him.

The klaxon overhead was still blaring, louder than he remembered it being. Right. He was on an Imperial ship. His eyes drifted along the corridor; carbon and blood smeared the deck, and sparks flew from one of the bulkhead maintenance panels. Something heavy was pressed against his leg, and it had been there long enough for the limb to go numb. With a groan, he worked his thigh free and heard something fall to the deck with a wet slap. A body.

He remembered this, too. Gideon was dead. The thought brought him no relief.

He rolled to his knees, and a sharp pain lanced up his side. There was a knot deep in his stomach, a horrible wound not fully healed—a wound that should have killed him. He looked down and palpated his side with his fingers, breath hissing out between clenched teeth. Tugging at the frayed and charred edges of the hole in his bodysuit, he gingerly inspected the wound. His skin was slick with dark blood, but where there had once been a horrific rend in his abdomen, there was now only a furiously red and jagged scar.

Frowning in confusion, Din glanced over at where he'd been laying—and flinched at what he saw, unable to process it for a moment.

The kid was there, on his side, more pale than ever, terribly small, his jumper soaked through with blood. He was not moving.

"No—no, no, no, no, no—"

His breath sobbed out of him as he cupped his hand under the kid's head and pulled him gently off the deck, cradling his little body in front of him. He barely weighed anything—he had definitely lost weight since Gideon had taken him. His large, dark eyes were closed, and he hung limply in Din's arms.

"Kid," he whispered, dazed, and rocked him gently. "Kid, are you… you can't—"

The fuzz on his head was dark and wiry with dried blood. He was just a wisp in Din's arms, frail skin drained of all colour. Something deep in his chest cracked open as he adjusted his grip on the kid and leaned down, pressing an ear to his chest and squeezing his eyes closed.

"Breathe, buddy," he whispered, and felt fresh tears wet the front of the kid's jumper. "You gotta breathe—"

He held his own breath, trying to force his heart to slow down. The inside of his head was too loud to hear anything, because there had to be _something,_ the kid had to be breathing—

He pulled his head up and ripped off a glove with his teeth, pulling the collar of the kid's jumper down and fumbling for a pulse. If it was there, it was too quiet to hear in his chest—

His comlink lit up. He ignored it and held his breath, waiting to feel something, anything.

" _Mando?"_ It was Cara. " _Mando, are you there? Do you have the kid?"_

His vision blurred out again, and he blinked away the next wave of tears. "Come on," he whispered, kneeling over the kid again, his ear hovering above his mouth and nose now. "I know you're in there, kid—"

Finally, there was a soft rustle of air by his ear. Keeping his thumb pressed under the kid's jaw, he registered a weak, fluttering pulse. He was alive, if barely. Din pressed his face into his jumper and let out the breath he'd been holding, which escaped his lungs in a weary sob. The kid was alive.

" _Mando!"_

His eyes squeezed shut as he quickly, calmly, tucked his emotions into a neat box at the back of his mind. This was not a reunion, and his mission was not complete yet.

Sitting upright again, he pressed the kid to his chest and patted his belt until he found his comlink. Bringing the end of it up to his mouth, he clicked it on. "Here."

" _Are you—what happened? Is the kid okay?"_

"Yeah," he said shakily. "Yeah, he's—he needs help." With a hiss of pained breath, he rolled up to his feet, grabbing his discarded glove on the way. His head swam, making him stumble and brace against the wall with his shoulder. The kid might've fixed him up, but he'd still lost a lot of blood. "Cara—"

" _I'm here."_ Even through the crackle of the comlink, he could hear the ragged, worried edge in her voice. He probably didn't sound too hot, either. " _Talk to me."_

"The kid, he—he needs help." Din glanced down at him, resisting the urge to check his pulse again. He was alive, even if he didn't look like it.

" _We've taken the medbay,"_ she assured him. " _Get yourself up here. But be careful, because—"_

The ship rocked again, and he looked up to watch the emergency lights flicker. "What was that?"

" _Dark Troopers, probably,"_ she muttered wearily. " _Something else to deal with. Did you run into Gideon?"_

"Yes."

" _And?"_

He swallowed. "I had to kill him," he said quietly. There was a long pause on Cara's end before he spoke again. "I'm sorry, I know you were trying to capture him—"

" _It's alright,"_ she interrupted. " _Just wish I could've been there to see it."_

Din glanced at his helmet still lying on the floor. "Yeah."

" _Well, get up here, and we'll—uh. What the fuck?"_ Her voice sounded far away, and there was a scuffle over the comm. " _Hey! Excuse me—"_

The ship rocked again, and the overhead lights flickered. Static and indistinct shouting came from the other end of the line, and the throbbing headache in his temples grew worse. In the meantime, he shoved away from the wall and ducked into the kid's cell, retrieving his gun from the floor and holstering it by his thigh. He'd either been passed out for longer than he thought, or the Dark Troopers had recovered more quickly than anticipated. Not dwelling on how difficult it had been to kill a single one of them, he stepped back out of the cell.

He could still hear fragmented arguing over the comlink, and then Cara's voice returned, speaking as if they hadn't just been interrupted. " _Mando."_

"What's happening?"

" _Be careful when you approach the bow,"_ Cara continued, ignoring his question. " _The bridge and the lead corridor were vented—"_

"Vented?"

" _Yes, vented. Contact me when you get close. I'll give you directions to a maintenance hallway so you can bypass it, and—well, the Dark Troopers."_ She paused. The unsettled tone of her voice was alarming—he never knew her to be anything but frosty and rock solid during a fight, no matter how grim things got. " _Just—get up here, and fast."_

The comlink clicked off, and he stared at it for a moment, still a little dazed, before shoving it back into his belt. He needed to get moving.

Din glanced around the corridor, keeping the kid cradled close to his chest. He needed more than a pistol if the Dark Troopers had re-boarded. The first thing he spotted was the spear, still lying haphazardly on the deck where Gideon had kicked it aside. He grabbed it and quickly slotted it beside his jetpack, wincing at how swollen and stiff his hand was. He thought maybe one of his knuckles were broken, but there wasn't any time to dwell on that now.

Turning around, he saw his knife sticking out of Gideon's throat. No longer tangled up with the body, he had a full view of the desperate, grisly mess their fight had caused; narrow fans of blood coated the walls and spread in a grimy, swiping mess on the floor, and some of it was still leaking out of Gideon.

His boots squelched as he stepped closer. Removing the knife released a final, weak spray of blood that coated his vambrace, and he went to wipe the blade clean on his bodysuit before discovering that most of him was covered in blood, too. With a huff he slid it back into the sheath in his boot and then, finally, looked down at his helmet.

His face was still sticky with dried blood, and the air cycling through the corridor made him shiver whenever it brushed against his skin. Kneeling down, his fingers wrapped around the lip of the helmet, and with a shaky hand he shoved it back onto his head. The inside of his helmet filled with the acrid smell of copper.

It sat differently upon his head now, uneasy and delicate. _Later,_ he told himself, and wiped clean the smeared glass of his visor. He would deal with all of this, all of what had happened—later.

The kid was still passed out, but Din could feel the weak thump of his heart where his hand was pressed against the kid's back. It steadied him, too. There was something lingering in the back of his mind, and it felt like the echo of the kid's voice from earlier. It was the reason he hadn't succumbed to a blind panic yet, despite how frail the kid looked and felt—he could feel him, somehow, his presence like a physical thing in his head. And Cara was right; he was a sturdy little guy.

"Let's go," he whispered, and was about to be on his way before he spotted the dormant hilt of the Darksaber on the ground. Amongst the gore and the mess, it could have easily been mistaken for a bit of scrap metal from the destroyed bulkhead paneling. Stooping low to pick it up, he turned it in his palm until he found the release mechanism for the blade. With a strange, electric hiss, it shot out of the hilt and expanded until it was longer than the span of his arm. The weight of it, somehow, balanced out, despite the blade itself having virtually no mass. It wasn't like it was heavy; instead he felt an odd pull, as if the tip of the saber was drawn towards the deck.

He glanced at Gideon's corpse one more time, twisted up unceremoniously on the ground. Without the vast billow of his cloak and the usual, self-assured arrogance pulling at his features, he looked like any other dead man. And Din had met many of those.

"Thanks for the sword," he muttered, and then began to move.

* * *

"He _killed_ Gideon?"

Bo-Katan was hard to deal with when things were going her way. Right now she was being downright insufferable, and looked like she was going to lunge for Cara's comlink again.

"He killed him!" she repeated when Cara didn't answer her.

Cara shrugged. "Apparently. I thought you wanted him dead, anyw—"

" _He_ was not supposed to do it!" she snarled, her finger jabbing in the direction of the door. "It was not his fight to win!"

"Can we talk about this later?"

Cara glanced around at the medbay. Bo-Katan's outburst had scared the Imps into a corner, and now that Koska's leg was properly looked after, Fennec was thumbing through the security feed on the main console to find them an exit route.

Her hand clenched around the comlink. Maybe she shouldn't have told Djarin to come up here—Dark Troopers were still pummelling away at the airlock door, and she didn't know how long it would hold. But if they couldn't hole up here, where could they go? She'd been feeling claustrophobic for a while now, but it was starting to get to her.

Giving a fuming Bo-Katan a wide berth, Cara stepped around to look over Fennec's shoulder. "Any luck?"

"They're crawling all over the place," Fennec muttered. There was a tremor in her hand as she clicked through the security feeds. Cara watched the tiny screen fizzle through shots of various corridors throughout the decks. Dark Troopers could be seen in at least a dozen of the camera feeds, all stalking through different parts of the ship.

She thought about how haggard Djarin had sounded over the comm, and how difficult it had been for the four of them to take a single Trooper down. If he ran into one—

"Did you call Fett?" Cara asked, swallowing.

Fennec nodded absentmindedly, still flicking through the feeds. "ETA fifteen minutes."

"Do we have that much time?"

"I'm trying to figure that out."

The words had come out harsh, in a _please-stop-bothering-me_ kind of way, so Cara backed off and turned around to find Bo-Katan standing completely still in the middle of the medbay. Her hands rested on both pistols, which had been holstered for the time being, but she didn't look calm.

Cara glanced at Koska. She'd been moved away from the door, and was leaning against one of the supply cabinets. Her helmet was off, and her face was shiny with sweat and pinched with pain. Cara's sympathy for her was tempered slightly by the company she kept, but the woman wasn't a complainer, at least.

"We're finding an exit path," Cara said, a bit tentatively. "We might be able to hide in one of the lower—"

"I don't care," Bo-Katan said quietly. She was still staring straight ahead. "I'm finding your friend."

"For what?"

"He has the Darksaber." Her helmet swivelled in Cara's direction. "It's mine."

She stopped herself from rolling her eyes. "He can give it to you when we meet up with him."

"No," she said harshly, and drew both pistols. "He can't."

Bo-Katan moved fast—faster than Cara could react. She took aim at the Imps hiding in the corner and unloaded both of her pistols into them. Plasma boiled, hissing over a chorus of short, sharp, agonised screams, and then their bodies toppled against one another, fanning out across their packed corner of the deck.

Cara and Fennec both stared, disbelieving, watching their corpses smoke in the corner, piled haphazardly atop one another. Cara turned to Bo-Katan.

"What the fuck are you _doing?"_

"The deal is off," she replied, alarmingly cool-headed now. She did not holster her blasters. "If he can't abide by my terms, I won't abide by his."

Cara looked back at the bodies. She saw the blonde-haired woman amongst them, the medical patch on her arm a bright red. Bo-Katan had just killed Djarin's kid.

She could feel herself beginning to unbutton. Cara closed her eyes for a moment, her breath shaking out of her. This had happened before; missions going so sideways that everyone began to break down.

She didn't have that luxury. Djarin needed her—so did Fennec.

Cara opened her eyes and looked at Bo-Katan. "You think you're going to go out there and kill him, then?"

"I'm not letting him get gunned down by a Dark Trooper." Katan was locking her vambraces, checking her munitions, adjusting her helmet. Her pistols were firm in her grip as she did so. "He's mine."

"Are you—insane?" Cara gestured behind her, back at the security feed. "There are Troopers everywhere! You think you can find him before they do, kill him, and then shoot your way out?"

One of Bo-Katan's pistols waved in Cara's direction. "You are not stopping me."

"No I certainly fucking am not. I'm not having a shootout with in you in h—"

There was a metallic screech on the other side of the door, and they all looked towards the entrance. There was a sizable dent in the door now. The medbay would not be theirs for long.

"Fennec?" Cara asked.

"I have a route," she reported. "We need to get to the auxiliary launch bay—it's opposite to the one we used to insert." She pushed away from the console and looked at them. "It should be clear. We can grab a TIE or two, fly out, and meet up with Fett."

"Great." She grabbed her rifle and shouldered the strap, and then did a quick sweep of the room. They wouldn't be coming back here again. Her eyes caught on the supply cabinet, and after a moment's thought she stalked over to it and pulled it open. She didn't know what the kid might need in the way of medical supplies, but—

"What are you doing?" Bo-Katan asked.

"You killed the only doctor on this ship," she replied, not looking away from the cabinet. She needed a bag of some kind. "Kid needs medical attention." There was an insulated bag folded up on the top shelf, and she began shoving first aid supplies into it. "You're responsible for moving Koska," Cara threw over her shoulder. "I'm done helping you."

* * *

The deck underneath his feet shuddered as he walked quietly through the lower decks. So many alarms were blaring by now that it was impossible to distinguish what emergency they were each signalling. If Bo-Katan still wanted this cruiser, it would need a massive amount of repairs.

His pace was slow to the point of frustration. Burdened by exhaustion and the panic crawling up his throat, it took him far too long to move through the lower corridors. He had to stick close to the walls, scanning each hallway for alcoves before advancing. There were no signs of any Dark Troopers yet, but he couldn't afford to run into one again.

His comlink crackled by his side, making him duck into the nearest available cover—which happened to be a rack of wiring. He fished out the comlink quickly from his belt and clicked on the receiver.

"What?" he hissed quietly.

" _Sorry,"_ Cara whispered back. She sounded slightly winded, like she was running. " _Change of plan. Meet us in the auxiliary launch bay. The medbay was breached."_

He closed his eyes, and pressed the kid closer to his shoulder. "Cara, the kid is—"

" _I know. I grabbed some supplies."_

"Is there a doctor with you?"

A pause. " _No,"_ she said finally. " _But Fett's coming to pick us up—you can hand him over to Pershing if he needs serious care."_

"He does."

There was another pause, and the line crackled. " _I'm sorry. Shit is… really not going well right now."_ She cleared her throat, and her voice came out more measured when she spoke again. " _We're making our way down. You know where the bay is?"_

"Yeah," he breathed. "Yeah, I got it. It's closer than the bridge, anyway."

" _Good. Be careful. Watch for—"_

"I know."

A final pause. " _See you soon."_

The line cut. He knew she wouldn't contact him again.

He tucked the comlink into his belt, and then, unable to help himself, glanced down at the kid. "Please keep breathing," he whispered, rubbing a thumb across his head. The ship rocked again, making him look up, and this time, the lights flickered.

Din glanced out from behind the wiring and checked the hallway. When he confirmed it was clear, and could hear no sign of Dark Troopers approaching, he slipped out from behind cover and began to move gingerly along the near wall of the corridor. The Darksaber's hilt was heavy at his belt, clinking faintly against his hip plate.

The best way to the auxiliary bay would be to double back along the path he'd taken to the brig when they first boarded the cruiser. That route was short, and under different circumstances he would've been able to get to the launch bay in a matter of minutes. But now—

The ship shook again, much stronger this time, and he had to brace a hand on the wall to keep his balance. The overhead lights flickered, then went out; red emergency bulbs switched on a moment later. Cara hadn't told him what was going on, and there wasn't time to ask, but Din had been on sinking ships before. And if Fett was coming to pick them up, this cruiser was in far worse shape than he'd thought. Judging by the strength of the tremors, they were either under heavy fire, or decks were being vented. Neither of which he could do anything about, so he put it out of his mind.

Din stuck to side corridors when he could, opting for the narrow, tightly-packed maintenance hallways that made up the guts of this ship; wide, shiny decks and plated walls were for officers—and Dark Troopers—to walk through. He thought that maybe he could hear a couple people from the maintenance crew whispering furiously to one another as he shoved through the low-ceiling mechanical compartments and hallways, but he didn't bother to look for their hiding places, and they certainly weren't going to approach an armed Mandalorian covered in blood.

He managed to make it halfway to the launch bay before he heard the heavy, methodical footsteps of a Dark Trooper. Having cleared the lowest decks, hiding spots were more difficult to come by. The corridors were mostly flat walls and wide, open floors with a large field of view available.

Din looked around. He was at the midpoint in the hallway, and he could hear the Trooper approaching from the port side of the upcoming T-junction. Doubling back would mean finding an alternative route to the launch bay, and he wasn't familiar enough with the layout of the cruiser for that to be an easy task.

Allowing himself the luxury of an unvoiced curse, he slowly retreated back the way he'd come. He would find a better hiding place and wait for the Trooper to pass him by, then continue forward. He knew they were probably looking for Gideon, so they would have to make their way to the brig. When they found their Moff dead, then, well—hopefully he would be clear of the cruiser by that point.

He had to lose ground on three separate corridors before he found a suitable hovel to shove himself into. It was an alcove behind a complex routing of water pipes—they were all hot to the touch, and would hopefully mask his heat signature from the Troopers.

Pressing up against the wall until his jetpack clinked against it, he did his best to keep his heart rate low. And then he waited.

Din closed his eyes and focused on the faint thrum of the kid's heart and breathing against his hand. He was hardly a medical expert, but he thought maybe the kid's vitals had stabilised—his breathing was still even, and though faint, his heart continued to beat steadily. He hoped that meant something good.

And the kid hadn't fully healed him, either. Not like he had with Greef. The stab in Din's side still burned, and pulled like a deep stitch whenever he moved too abruptly. Maybe the kid had reached his limit, or there was only so much he could fix for an injury that severe. Either way, it made his movements stiff and painful, and he would spend the rest of his life repaying this debt.

His eyes opened. He could hear the Trooper approaching. The inside of his helmet was loud with breath and the pounding of his heart, and he tried to quiet them both. He didn't know the extent or scope of the Dark Trooper's sensory functions, but they were likely better than anything he had at his disposal.

It was difficult to see anything from the other side of the pipes. The lighting in the hallway was a low red, and the Trooper wasn't using any external light. He doubted they cared about maintaining the element of surprise, so that meant they likely didn't have active night vision. Heat sensors would be much more effective when searching for targets on an Imperial cruiser—

He inhaled, and held. The large, disjointed form of the Trooper appeared through the gaps between the pipes. Its movements were stiff, its arms too long and its steel ribcage pulled open and exposed. Din remembered one of them had hit the door on the way out when he'd vented them.

The front of its outer hull hung off its chest like mechanical carrion, though it didn't seem bothered by its exposed innards. Pistons worked inside its chest cavity, drumming entirely unlike the beat of a heart—too loud, too rapid, too hissing. He could see now the core of it, a large coiled battery that thrummed with power.

It turned to face the wall of pipes, appraising the heat it gave off—or the shadows beyond them. It was difficult to tell. The blood in his ears began to pound as it considered its newest puzzle. He could see baleful, angular eyes scanning the pipes, brighter and more intense than the low crimson lighting of the deck.

Din eased up his grip on the kid. On instinct his hand had wrapped around the grip of his pistol, and his throat was starting to burn. He needed to breathe, but not yet. Not now. Instead he watched its head rotate on the thick joint of its neck as it slowly scanned the pipes, its head moving in small, jerking degrees accompanied by a ticking sound. There was no way to tell where the centre of its vision was, but Din thought it had locked eyes with him. He did not move, and he did not breathe.

It considered him, or perhaps the heat he gave off. He still was not able to tell—this alcove was dark, and the gore on his armour meant his beskar did not reflect what little red light shone through the pipes. The steam flowing through them could be hiding him just as easily as the shadows they cast.

It stared at him, unmoving, and then folded upwards. Every part of him screamed to move, to exhale, to take aim at the battery in its chest and fire until it fell dead to the ground. There was something wrong with this Trooper—it looked as if its joints had all been pulled from their sockets and overextended, giving it an ungainly appearance. It had suffered some sort of abuse, but looked no less deadly for it.

He watched the arm with the rifle attached to it, waiting for it to take aim. It lifted—and then socketed into the opposite hand, before turning back to the corridor and continuing its stalk through the cruiser.

Din waited until he heard it round the corner before finally letting out the breath he'd been holding in as quietly as he could. It rasped against the inside of his helmet, and his lungs and throat burned with the itch to cough. He swallowed it down and relaxed against the wall for a moment, waiting for his heart to slow.

Only a dozen more hallways to go.

* * *

To say that there was a giant fucking hole in the safety shutters of the auxiliary launch bay would be an understatement. The Dark Troopers had boarded the ship from all directions and entry points, and if they had been too slow to pass under the shutters, they'd forced their way in.

The route from the medbay had been relatively quiet. Aside from a close call or two, Fennec's path had held true; they'd met surprisingly little resistance as they made their way down to the launch bay. The ship had shook and shuddered under the abuse of the Troopers prying their way in, and more than once, Cara heard adjacent decks depressurise as a few Troopers entered through the outer hull. It made for slow-going, but they'd arrived at the launch bay intact.

Cara mentally patted herself on the back for forcing Bo-Katan to take care of Koska. It had prevented her from running off on her own to track down Djarin, and proximity to her injured comrade seemed to have tempered her ire somewhat. She'd shifted from a loud fury to a silent, simmering rage, and the silent part was all that mattered to Cara.

There was little cover to hide behind on the deck, so they made their way across the bay as quickly and as quietly as they could. Through one of the electromagnetic atmospheric barriers that still covered all external exits from the bay, Cara could see stars twinkling through the huge rip in the safety shutter. It looked big enough to fit something as large as an X-Wing through, so she counted that as a plus. At least they'd have no problem flying out of here.

The only thing stopping them now were all the Dark Troopers in the launch bay.

None of the Troopers had spotted them yet, but that wouldn't last long. The launch bay was large enough that they could sneak between errant fuel canisters and the giant docking clamps that hung suspended from the roof of the bay, but they would be spotted eventually. Right now, Cara's current goal was the bank of TIE fighters docked closest to the stern exit, which was where the tear in the safety shutter was located.

Cara held up a fist and they all paused, ducking behind a rack of fuel canisters. Starts and stops took the longest because of Koska's leg; her movements were stiff and painful as Katan lowered her down gingerly to the deck.

She waited until everyone turned to her, and then Cara spoke in a low voice. "We'll need two TIEs," she whispered. "We can't fit five people in one of them."

"Five?" Bo-Katan asked, glancing between the four of them.

"Us and Mando," Cara reminded her, irritated. "He'll be here soon."

 _He fucking better be,_ she thought. She was starting to get worried. He'd sounded rough on the comm, and if he ran into a Trooper—

She shelved the thought. There was nothing she could do but hope he got here soon.

"You and Koska will take the nearest TIE," Cara continued, nodding to Bo-Katan. "Fennec and I will take the next one over. Start up both at once to distract them, and fly out one at a time." She looked at Fennec. "Is Fett here?"

"Should be," she whispered. "He's usually on time."

"Good." Rolling her weight on the balls of her feet, Cara turned in a duck-walk to peek around the edge of a fuel canister into the bay. She counted at least four Troopers; they looked idle for the time being, probably waiting for someone to show up and do something as stupid and reckless as they were about to.

"Are we waiting for Mando?" Fennec whispered behind her.

"I want to," she whispered back, but she was unsure. Ideally, they'd hide in the TIEs undetected until he got here, then power them up and get him to jump in as they left. But she didn't think they'd manage the undetected part; Koska couldn't climb and didn't have a jetpack anymore, which meant Bo-Katan would have to lift them both up through a combination of upper body strength and her own jetpack to get to the TIE's hatch. And that would make a lot of noise.

"Dune?" Katan asked.

"I'm thinking," she hissed back. It was too risky to contact Djarin and ask him how long he would be, but waiting here, behind a bunch of fuel canisters as cover, was an incredibly bad idea. All it took was a single Trooper noticing them hiding here to blow them all to pieces.

Cara was about to speak when an awful, piercing sound came from each of the Troopers milling about the middle of the bay. It sounded like a scream, or some kind of alarm, and they all made the same noise in tandem. Cara and Fennec both covered their ears, unprotected by a helmet.

She looked over her shoulder at Fennec, who mouthed _what the fuck?_ at her. Katan and Koska didn't seem to have answers either; they just shook their heads.

Cara looked back around the fuel canister at the droids. They were all still making that awful siren noise, and seemed to move around more animatedly now, as if on high-alert. Instead of standing in the centre of the deck more or less waiting for instruction, they began stalking around the bay with deadly purpose.

And one of them was headed in their direction.

"Move, now!" Cara said to all of them, and waited for Katan to pull Koska's arm around her shoulder before jumping up from their cover. Cara made a hard sprint for the second TIE, trying to draw the attention of the Trooper so it didn't take aim at the fuel canisters.

In between the wailing noises, she could hear the grating, metallic grumble of its vocaliser, its words garbled by an encryption that could only be understood by the other Dark Troopers. It was a horrifying sound.

She was only about fifty meters to the second TIE. In her periphery, she saw the Trooper hold up its rifle and take aim at her. Thinking quickly, Cara ducked behind one of the hexagonal wings of the first fighter and narrowly avoided catching a bolt of plasma.

Behind her, Bo-Katan's jetpack hissed as it activated, and Cara glanced back for a moment to see her struggling to jump from the deck to the top hatch of the TIE fighter. Koska provided covering fire as best she could, trading shots with Trooper. None of the shots actually hurt the droid, but Koska's beskar was similarly unmarred by plasma.

Cara didn't have that luxury, so she kept her head down and made for the second TIE at full speed. Fennec was close behind her, keeping pace, and swore when the other Troopers turned in their direction.

 _Every part of this fucking plan,_ Cara thought as she closed the last few metres of distance and began to scale the TIE, _every fucking part of this_ _ **stupid**_ _fucking plan hasn't worked from the fucking word go—_

Plasma splashed at her feet. She heard the leather of her boot hiss as she used the space between a wing and the spherical body of the fighter to climb towards the hatch. These things were a pain in the ass to scale without a ladder, and they were especially difficult to climb when being shot at by a firing squad of murderous droids.

Cara got a hold of the thick wing strut that stuck out from the body of the TIE and hauled herself up. On the other side of the wing, she could hear Bo-Katan yanking open the cockpit hatch of her own fighter and helping Koska inside.

A flurry of blaster fire whizzed around her. She turned to look back down at the deck and offered a hand up to Fennec. The woman stretched her rifle up, and Cara grabbed the stock to haul her up onto the wing strut. She could hear the steel of the TIE's wing cooking from the hits it was taking, and Koska was no longer available to distract the Troopers, who were all quickly advancing on their position.

"Up and inside!" Cara yelled over the still-deafening sound of the droids wailing, cupping her hands together for Fennec to use as a step up. With a deft hop, the woman nimbly scaled the rest of the TIE, and Cara turned to fire a volley of shots with her pistol at the Troopers while Fennec pried open the hatch.

The high ceilings and expansive deck of the launch bay meant every sound bounced and echoed around the room. It had the effect of making it seem like there were double the amount of Troopers in the bay, and with the way their day was going, Cara was sure more were on the way to provide back-up. It also made verbal communication virtually impossible; between the blaster fire, the pitched alert wailing, and the various other stomping and mechanical growling noises the droids were making, the launch bay was a veritable cacophony of unholy noises.

Unable to signal with a yell, Fennec tapped Cara with the butt of her rifle and motioned for her to climb up. Cara grabbed the butt as a handhold and pulled herself up, using the now-opened hatch as cover as she climbed in after Fennec. TIEs were a tight squeeze with only one occupant, and Cara did her best to stay out of the way as Fennec jumped into the pilot seat and started up the ignition.

"What are you doing?" Cara said too loudly after closing the cockpit hatch. It was much quieter now, but her ears were ringing. "We can't leave without—"

"I'm not," Fennec cut her off. "Hold onto something."

Cara grabbed a support bar above her, and felt her centre of gravity swoop low into her stomach as the TIE lifted off the deck. Through the glass cockpit canopy she could see that Bo-Katan had done the same; they were both hovering a few feet in air now, and the guns on Katan's fighter were shivering as they primed to fire.

"Hope this doesn't decompress the bay," Fennec muttered. Their own twin guns whined as they powered up, and then she fired a shot at the nearest Trooper.

It was hard to see the effect at first. The shot produced a large billow of black carbonous smoke that obscured visibility where it splashed the deck around the Trooper. In her periphery, Cara saw Bo-Katan fire on another Trooper. Fennec didn't wait to see what the result was, either; she jimmied the steering controls until the TIE faced the next Trooper and fired on it. The steel plating of the bay flickered brilliantly from the bolts of green plasma singing across the deck, significantly larger and more powerful than any handheld blaster could ever produce.

Cara watched as a figure emerged from the smoke, advancing outside the dark cloud. The Trooper looked ashen from the carbon scoring, but from this distance she couldn't tell if the shot had done anything—only that it hadn't dealt enough damage to destroy it.

"These things _really_ hate dying!" Fennec's voice rose an octave, a rare vocal betrayal of her nerves, before she fired more shots. The glass canopy polarised slightly as both her and Bo-Katan held down the trigger, and the bay was lit up in a bath of vibrant green and red plasma rounds.

" _Cara!"_

Jumping, Cara looked down at her belt—the voice had come from there. She frantically pulled out her comlink and switched it on. "Mando!" she yelled back, and let out an exhale of relief. "Where—"

" _Coming up—on the bay!"_ He sounded out of breath. " _Where are you?"_

"Also in the bay, but it's hot in here. We grabbed some TIE fighters—" The line crackled. In the background, she could hear the same, high-pitched wailing on his end. "Are you being chased?"

" _Yes! I'm coming up—"_ Another pause, where she heard a mix of heavy breathing and the dangerously loud mechanical growl of a Trooper. "— _Starboard entrance!"_

The line cut. Fennec, overhearing the conversation, already began to guide their TIE fighter portside to draw the fire of the Troopers away from the starboard doors. Bo-Katan's own fighter was edging closer to the stern—where their exit hole was.

Cara reached over Fennec's shoulder and roughly keyed the fighter-to-fighter communications. "Where the hell do you think you're going?"

" _Nowhere!"_ Katan shot back furiously, enraged at having been accused of running from a fight. " _I'm getting out of your fucking way!"_

Cara ignored her tone—and pushed down the twinge of guilt. Asshole or no, Mandalorians didn't back down from a firefight. "Mando will be here any minute. Keep the DTs away from the starboard end of the deck."

Bo-Katan said something unintelligible before cutting the comms off. Fennec snorted.

"You're not doing yourself any favours," she told Cara, still busy firing away. It was impossible to tell what concentrated anti-aircraft rounds were doing to the Dark Troopers, but whatever it was, it wasn't happening fast enough. The glass canopy of their fighter was a wash of crimson blaster rounds, splashing off the viewport uselessly but making visibility even more of a problem.

"I don't need favours from her. Keep firing."

A cry of " _Reinforcements!"_ came over the fighter's comms again, but this time it was Koska's voice. " _Behind you!"_

Fennec swivelled the TIE a hundred and eighty degrees. Cara heard something heavy and hard slam against the left wing. Now that they weren't being bombarded with blaster fire, she could finally see out of the viewport again.

The portside doors had all opened, and she saw six additional Troopers enter the bay.

* * *

It was difficult to make sense of anything. Smoke filled the auxiliary launch bay, and what air was still clear flashed from a constant torrent of blaster fire. The panicked screeching the droids had been making ever since they had discovered their Moff had died echoed across the expansive deck, and without being able to see any of them, it sounded like the wailing of ghosts. Even the two TIEs hanging in the air were difficult to see; their hexagonal wings flickered in and out of view as they wobbled around in the billows of smoke, suspended above the deck, firing upon any Troopers that got too close.

Din hoped the disorientation was mutual. He sprinted out into the bay, immediately flanking left, and made for the nearest available cover; the arm of a fighter docking clamp. His stealth in the lower corridors had only lasted him for so long, and he'd spent the last stretch of his route running from advancing Troopers.

Gasping for breath, he ducked behind the giant arm of the clamp and made himself as narrow as possible, tucking his shoulders in and adjusting the kid in his grip. Visibility was slightly better here—that wasn't nearly as much smoke—but it was hard to get a proper view of the deck without ducking around the clamp to look, and he wasn't about to reveal himself.

Instead, he tried to listen. It sounded like the entire platoon of Dark Troopers had entered the bay by this point, but it was impossible to tell. Their wailing was unbearably loud, and coupled with the blaster fire, he could hear nothing else.

Din tried to catch his breath, swallowing hard, the wound in his side burning furiously. He had to get to one of the TIEs. Both of them were on opposite ends of the launch bay, and the closest one—the one near the stern exit, where a sizeable hole had been punched through the safety shutter—would require him to pass through where the fighting was thickest. Alternatively, he could try to grab one for himself; there were a few still left inert on the deck, but that would also require him to run a fair amount of distance with little cover.

Fishing for his comlink, he pulled it up and stuck the receiver under the lip of his helmet, hoping that would help with the noise. "Cara," he whispered furiously.

She responded immediately. " _You in the launch bay?"_

"Yes," he said breathlessly. "I'm hiding. In the—" He glanced around, "—the starboard bow corner of the deck, behind a docking clamp. I can't move." If it weren't for the kid in his arms, he'd consider booking it, but a single stray blaster bolt could easily—

He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. "I can't move," he repeated.

" _We'll try to get to you,"_ she replied, but the uncertainty in her voice was alarming. " _They've started flying around the bay! There's so many of them—"_

He badly wanted to check behind him, to see where the Troopers chasing him had gone. They didn't seem to have followed him—he'd be dead already. His jetpack dug into his spine as he pressed up against the docking clamp, jarring the exit wound in his back, and the spear clinked against the steel.

Before he could respond to Cara, he heard a horrific rending sound—steel shearing against steel. Risking a glance, he looked around the massive arm of the docking clamp and saw one of the TIEs spiralling mid-air, trying to shake loose a Trooper that had crawled on top of it. It was punching holes in one of the wings, flinging black bits of iron around the bay with every hit.

" _Shit,"_ he heard Cara swear, and then her voice was far away as she held the comm away. " _Katan! Stop moving, we'll try to blast it off you—"_

" _That won't do anything!"_ he heard Bo-Katan yell back. Then he saw the TIE ram into the wall, wing-first, trying to scrape the droid off like an insect. More steel-on-steel screeching filled the bay, somehow even louder than the wailing of the Troopers.

He tracked its path. It left deep, hideous scoring in the metal, along with a few dents—and yet the Trooper held on. Half the wing had been ripped off of the fighter now, and he could see the TIE visibly listing to the side, off-balance and injured. The other Troopers, inspired by the success of their comrade, joined in. Rocketing off the decks as one, they swarmed the two fighters like flies, grabbing onto anything that would give purchase—or making handholds in the steel when there were none available.

" _Djarin!"_ Cara again, and he finally heard what she had been holding back for the last few hours—panic, pure and raw, filled her voice. " _Djarin, I don't know what to do—"_

"It's okay," he counselled, knowing it was a lie, knowing she wouldn't believe it either. He couldn't stay where he was, but the kid—

He looked down at the kid, his hand cupped around his pale little head. It was hard to tell what effect all the jostling, running, hiding, and panicking had done to him, but without the assurance of his faint heart beat against Din's palm, he looked dead. And he would be, soon, if Din didn't do something.

He looked up, back at the carnage, and saw that Bo-Katan's fighter had been grounded. The damaged wing stuck out from the smoke like an exposed bone, and he could see part of the craft had caught fire. Cara's TIE was wheeling in the air, trying desperately to shake loose the half-dozen Troopers swarming it. Their obsidian limbs crawled across the body of the fighter, covering every inch of pale steel, and he saw one attempting to punch open the glass canopy of the cockpit. From this range, the TIE's guns did nothing, but it still fired wildly, spraying emerald bolts everywhere in a vicious, vain attempt to buck them off. A few of the bolts flew in his direction, splashing the deck with bubbling plasma.

Din watched, and could do nothing, as the second TIE plummeted to the deck of the launch bay.

A thought occurred to him then—the thoughts of a coward. That he could hide here, and wait for the Troopers to kill everyone else, and when they moved on, he could steal a stray fighter and leave the ship. It would save the kid's life, and a part of himself, a part he did not like very much, told him that deal was worth it. That his friends had known what they were getting into when they agreed to this rescue operation. That he, in their place, would understand making that calculation. And that, given how weak and exhausted and old and broken he was, there was little else he could do.

His comlink crackled again. He turned it on and waited.

" _Djarin—"_ It was Cara. " _You have to get out of here—"_

"I know," he replied, strangely calm. "I'm sorry."

" _I know what I signed up for,"_ she said back. He could hear even through the comm the Troopers beating on the hull of the TIE. " _Are you somewhere hidden?"_

"Yes."

" _Good. Keep the kid safe."_

His hand clenched around the comlink. "Cara—"

" _This is the Way,"_ she said quietly.

He closed his eyes. "This is the Way."

Din slid slowly to the floor, cradling the kid in his arms as he sat on the deck. He felt tears track down his cheeks, and swallowed to get the lump out of his throat. The wailing of the Troopers had not stopped, but underneath it he could hear their gleeful chittering as they began to tear open the TIEs.

He was going to let them do that. His friends would die, and he would listen and wait.

Din stared down at the kid, still sleeping. There was a tiny muscle under his nose that was twitching, something he'd seen him do before when he was dreaming. Was he dreaming now?

"I'm sorry," he whispered to the kid, to himself, to Cara and his friends, and held the child close. He curled inward, covering the kid with his body, making sure he was protected by his beskar. It was all he could do.

Pressing his visor to the kid's head, Din waited.

* * *

The smoke from all the blaster fire was beginning to clear as the launch bay's air filters kicked into high gear. Some of it had filtered into the small cabin of the TIE fighter, coating the inside of Cara's mouth in a foul film that made the surface of her teeth feel grainy.

She and Fennec were pressed up against the back of the TIE's small cockpit, rifles aimed at the viewport. The glass was a webbed mess of cracks and splints; the Trooper on the other side was pummelling away methodically, unhurriedly, like it was in no particular rush to kill them.

The cabin rocked with each impact. Fennec's arm brushed against her own, but the woman was deadly silent, her jaw set and her eyes wide in terror as she gripped her rifle tightly. Both of them knew shooting their way out wasn't an option, but they weren't going to make the Trooper's job easy for them.

"What's it like?" Cara asked, and Fennec's head twitched slightly in her direction, though she didn't look away from the viewport.

"What's what like?"

"Dying."

"Oh." Her mouth curled up slightly. "It's quiet. I don't remember much."

"Quiet sounds nice," Cara muttered. The wailing of the Troopers was muffled by the thick steel and glass of the TIE's hull, but the internal alarms were blaring, and the glass creaked and groaned with each hit of the Trooper's fist.

"Yeah," Fennec sighed, lamenting. She sounded like she wanted to say more, but didn't. Instead she adjusted her grip on her rifle and peered down the sights.

The cabin rocked. Cara triple-checked her own weapon to make sure nothing was jammed, but she knew it wasn't. Her fingers shook; her heart was hammering all the way up into her throat. She thought about shooting herself in the head to get it over with. It would save her a lot of pain and misery, and it wasn't like there was any chance of things going their way. Not now.

But the stubborn part of her, the angry part that had never really gone away—not since Alderaan—wanted to hang on. To make these assholes really work for it. She'd made her peace with the fact that the Empire would probably be the ones who killed her, even if she hadn't imagined it going down like this.

"I really want a drink," Fennec muttered then beside her.

Cara looked at her, grinning. "We can go grab one after."

Fennec laughed. The noise came out a bit too hysterical, but it was a pretty good time to be hysterical right now.

The cabin rocked again. The canopy had finally lost its concave shape, and the glass now bowed inwards in the centre from the abuse it was taking. She could hear other Troopers on the hull, their limbs scraping across the steel as they searched for a way inside. Above them, another Trooper was clawing at the hatch, trying to peel it open. Fennec had locked down the emergency safety protocols for the fighter to slow them down, but that would only last so long.

Cara kept her eyes skyward. "Hatch or window? Which one do you think?"

The cabin rocked. "Window," Fennec said confidently. "It's almost broken."

"I dunno," she whispered, watching the Trooper above scrape its thick steel fingers across the small glass part of the hatch. "This guy is really going to town."

"Is that a bet?"

She shrugged. "It's not like I'm spending my money on anything else."

She braced for another impact—and then it didn't come. Glancing at Fennec, who looked just as surprised as she did, Cara then looked at the viewport.

It was impossible to see out of. The form of the Troopers was still vaguely visible, but it was completely still now. A glance above confirmed that the other Trooper had stopped, too.

"What the hell?"

"Reinforcements arrived?" Fennec offered doubtfully.

The guess was as good as any other, but Cara didn't buy it. Again they braced for another hit that did not come, and then the dashboard comms flared to life.

" _Dune?"_ It was Bo-Katan. " _Fennec? You still alive?"_

Cara leaned around the pilot's chair and clicked on the transmitter. "Still here."

" _Did they stop for you, too?"_

"Yeah."

" _Can you see anything?"_

Cara looked up at the viewport again. It was so webbed with cracks that it looked frosted; she could see the still shadow of the Trooper, but nothing else. "Nope."

Then she heard something else that was impossible—she heard one of the Troopers die.

Fennec appeared beside her, squinting at the viewport. "Is that Mando?"

The hull around them thumped as the Dark Troopers jumped down to address whatever threat had appeared in the bay. Cara didn't think it was Djarin—he would've told her his plan—but she had no idea who else it could be.

"Fett?" Cara suggested then.

Fennec shrugged. "Maybe."

They both looked up at the cockpit hatch. The Trooper that had been clawing at it was gone now, the glass heavily scratched but still intact.

"Is it a trap?" Fennec asked.

"I don't know. They were making good headway with the window." She stepped away from the TIE's dashboard, still frowning up at the hatch.

"I don't think we should—"

Fennec's words died in her throat. Both of them heard it. The screams of more Troopers; the rending of steel. It was muffled, but one by one, their wailing stopped.

Cara looked at her, raising a brow. Fennec shrugged in a _why-the-hell-not_ kind of way, and then reached down to release the safety mechanism for the hatch.

"Might as well," she muttered. Cara grabbed the support bar above her and pulled herself through the hatch.

She turned to look at the deck and froze. "Holy fucking shit."

"What?" Fennec asked below her, nudging her leg. "What's happening?"

"Jedi," Cara breathed.

* * *

It took him a while to register the noise. The sounds filling the bay were so overwhelming that he was sure he'd suffer serious damage to his hearing, but after the ringing in his ears began to fade, he realised what had changed—the Troopers had finally stopped wailing.

He rolled quietly onto a knee and peered around the arm of the docking clamp. In the middle of the bay sat an X-Wing that had very much not been there before. It blocked his line of sight, but over the top of the fighter he could see the damaged wing tips of the TIEs Cara and Bo-Katan had commandeered. They were no longer crawling with Dark Troopers, and he saw Cara, Fennec, Bo-Katan, and an injured Koska standing on the roofs of their fighters, gaping in disbelief at the deck below.

Din struggled to his feet. He needed the support of the docking clamp to stand; his body was so far beyond exhausted by this point that he could hardly bear the weight of his own body. He staggered to the wall nearby and braced a hand against it, limping slowly towards the middle of the bay so he could see what was happening. The kid was still pressed to his shoulder, nestled safely between his pauldron and breastplate.

Cara was the first to notice him as he approached, her head turning to meet his eyes. He paused and made a questioning gesture to the X-Wing. A part of him thought it would be darkly hilarious to survive this place and then immediately be arrested by the New Republic, but Cara responded with a wave for him to come closer. It was safe, whatever was happening. He nodded, and continued walking with the support of the wall.

It took him a minute or two to get far enough to see around the X-Wing, and by then the fighting was all but over. Across the deck he saw the bodies of Dark Troopers littering the floor; some had their chests fatally crushed by some great pressure, others had limbs severed entirely. In the middle of the carnage stood a man in an orange fighter pilot jumpsuit, holding a green, shimmering blade that was not unlike the sabers Ahsoka had wielded.

His breath caught. Is this who the kid had contacted on Tython?

"Mando!" Cara slid haphazardly down from the TIE, landing heavily on the deck, and ran towards him. He stayed where he was, not trusting himself to stand without the support of the wall, and watched her approach until she skidded to a stop a few feet in front of him, faltering at the grisly sight of his armour.

Her eyes were wide. "What the hell happened to you?"

He looked down at himself; at the blood on his beskar, at the singed tear in his bodysuit, at the kid tucked in his arm, frail and still.

Din looked back up at her. "It's a long story."

He tried to take a step towards her and swayed; she caught his arm, her grip steady on his elbow, and kept him on his feet. "You good?"

"No," he whispered, grabbing her arm with his free hand. "I'm sorry—"

"Don't start with that." She reached out for the kid, but stopped short of touching him. "Is he…?"

"I don't know what's wrong with him." It was hard to get the words out. "But he's not—that isn't his blood. He's stable for now, I think."

Cara glanced at him. "Is it _yours?"_

"Some of it," he said hoarsely. He nodded over her shoulder. "Who is that?"

She looked back at the deck. The others had gotten off their TIEs and were collecting loosely in the middle of the launch bay, speaking to the mysterious pilot. "I have my suspicions," Cara said quietly.

"He doesn't have a warrant out for me, does he?"

She laughed at that. "I highly doubt it. Come on."

Cara kept him steady as they moved. His head swam, and it was an effort just to walk. He wanted to sleep for the next week at least. But Cara was firm beside him, keeping him on his feet.

As they approached, he was surprised to see how young the pilot was; the man had to be at least ten years younger than Din, and many more still than Ahsoka. She'd told him the Jedi had fallen long ago—likely longer than he'd been alive.

"The kid," he rasped, and Cara looked at him. "He… searched for other Jedi, on Tython. He called out to them."

"Can't get much better than that guy."

"You know who he is?"

Cara arched a brow at him. "You really don't know your rebellion history, do you?"

"I know the gist," he said, a little defensively. "Never heard of any rebel Jedi."

"There was only one, as far as I know." She looked back at the pilot. "Thought it was just a story. A morale thing—boost everyone's spirits. Guess not."

She brought them to a stop several feet away. Up close, the pilot looked even younger—sandy hair that seemed like it was in need of a haircut, and a sharp, focused expression unmarred by the weariness of old soldiers. He was, also, the most dangerous person on the ship.

"Sounds like reinforcements are on their way," the young man said, looking at Din and Cara. His expression faltered, taken aback by the sight of a Mandalorian covered in blood. "Are you alright?"

"Who are you?" Din asked instead. He could see the man eyeing the kid, though he hadn't said anything yet. "Why did you help us?"

"My name is Luke," he replied. "I heard the child's call."

"You're a Jedi?"

Luke nodded. "Yes. May I see him?"

Din hesitated. He looked down at the kid in his arms, silent and unconscious. "There's something wrong with him."

Luke stepped closer, cautiously, and held out a hand. "May I?" he asked again, and this time Din nodded. He passed the kid over, but didn't let go, and watched as Luke touched his forehead.

He saw the kid's face twitch ever so slightly, but he didn't wake. Luke's expression slackened as his eyes closed, and it reminded him of the serene look Ahsoka had worn when speaking with the kid. Din wanted to ask immediately what he saw, what he heard, but held back.

In his periphery, he saw Cara step away and go over to Fennec, the two speaking quietly. He knew they had to get out of here, and soon; the Dark Troopers may have been dealt with, but there were still Imperial reinforcements on their way, and none of them were in fighting shape.

He also felt a pair of sharp eyes on him, and looked up to see Bo-Katan staring him down. Even through the black visor of her helmet, he knew she was glaring. She could defeat him with a firm push to the shoulder right now if she wanted to, and she looked like she wanted to do a lot more than just that to him.

His attention drew back to Luke when his head cocked slightly. "Well?"

Luke's eyes opened slowly, as if coming up from a body of water, and looked at Din. He seemed bewildered. "What did he do?"

The question was whispered, and sounded almost rhetorical; it was an expression of incredulity more than anything.

Din answered anyway. "He healed me. He saved my life."

"He healed you?"

He reached down and touched his abdomen, pulling at his bodysuit to expose the jagged scar. Luke looked at it, his brows knotting, and then swallowed.

"What's wrong?" Din asked.

"Nothing," he murmured. "I just… we need to leave." He met Din's eyes. "Quickly."

"Is he alright?"

"He's dying," Luke replied, sending a jolt of terror through him. "But I think I know what to do."

"You think?" Din clenched his jaw. "He needs a doctor—"

"No," Luke interrupted, more firmly this time. "No. I know where to bring him. You must come with me."

Din nodded. Luke relinquished the kid to him, and then nodded towards the X-Wing. "Let's go."

He glanced at his friends. "Right. Just a moment."

Cara turned around, hearing how his voice changed, and looked at him with a kindness he had not earned. "I have to leave," he told her. It came out like an apology. "I don't… know how to thank you—"

"Buy me a beer when you come back," she said, waving him off. "Go save your kid."

If he was less exhausted, he'd fight with her. Instead he simply nodded, and looked at Fennec. "Give Fett my gratitude," he said. "And you have mine as well. I owe you both a debt."

She smiled. "Of course."

Then he looked at Bo-Katan, who was still glaring at him. "I have your Darksaber," he said, and unclipped it from his belt. He held it out to her, and his hand wavered in the air. "You can have it."

"That isn't how this works," she hissed at him. "And you don't get to just leave. Not after this shitshow."

He saw Luke step up beside him, and her visor turned in his direction, head cocked in disgust. "Don't threaten me, Jedi."

"I'm not," Luke replied. He had his hand on his saber, but didn't draw it. "But we are leaving."

There was an unexpected steel in his voice. Din wasn't sure why it seemed so out of place; he'd just cut down a platoon of Dark Troopers a few moments ago. But the kid seemed oddly inconspicuous, like he'd be able to move through a crowd undetected. Perhaps he did, every day. If the Empire hunted the kid this ruthlessly, they probably hunted other Jedi, too.

Bo-Katan, to her credit, didn't challenge him further. Instead she looked at Din. "That is yours," she told him. "But it won't be for very long. I'll find you once this is done."

He tossed it at her feet, letting it drop to the deck. "Don't bother," he replied. "I don't want it."

"Mandalorian," Luke urged beside him. "We have to go. And you three should, too," he added, nodding to the others.

"We have a ride," Cara assured him, and nodded to Din. "Go on. I'll catch you around."

"Thank you," he said a final time, trying to impart how seriously he meant it. His gaze lingered on Cara, and then he turned, carefully, to follow Luke.

* * *

The X-Wing's passenger seat was directly behind the pilot's. He'd had to stow his jetpack and spear in order to fit comfortably in the fighter, but he was seated properly now, buckled in. The kid was in his arms, tucked gently into his side—the side that didn't have a giant wound in it. He'd swaddled him in his cloak, dirty as it was, since he had nothing else.

Luke was quiet as he guided the X-Wing out of the cruiser and into hyperspace. He was a capable pilot, on top of his skills as a swordsman, easing some of the lingering doubts in Din's mind about the decision to hop into a fighter with a very dangerous, very bizarre stranger. There was something unique about the Jedi he'd met; something about the way they carried themselves, in the way they spoke and met people's eyes. He'd felt it with Ahsoka, too. It was a feeling below instinct—a soft tug in his chest that told him he and the child would be safe. It had not steered him wrong before, and he was beginning to understand that where the kid was concerned, he would need to trust more than just his senses.

Din thought he should say something. Belatedly, he realised he hadn't even thanked the man for saving their lives.

He cleared his throat. "I'm—thank you," he said quietly. "For saving us."

Luke turned around in his seat to look at him. "It's no problem," he said quietly, and he sounded almost sheepish, as if embarrassed to be caught doing something so heroic and daring as a rescue attempt. "The source of the call led to an Imperial cruiser—I figured there'd be trouble."

"They keep hunting him." He looked down at the kid, the words coming out bitter. "They won't stop." Gideon might be dead, but he wasn't foolish enough to think that was the end of it. It never was.

"We'll be safe, where we're going," Luke promised. "You can rest there, too."

He nodded. A gloved finger touched the kid's cheek, watching him sleep. "Will he be alright?"

"I think he will be," Luke replied. The words were hesitant, but there was nevertheless a conviction behind them that put Din's mind at ease.

Luke looked like he wanted to say something else then, and then hesitated.

"What is it?" Din asked.

"You'll need to tell me what happened, exactly," he said. "There's… things about him I don't understand."

Din nodded. For some reason that didn't surprise him. The kid had always been extraordinary. "It's a long story. And I don't understand a lot of it, either."

"It's a several hour flight to Dagobah," Luke assured him. "We have time."

"That's where we're headed?"

"Yes. Although—" He gave Din a wincing once-over. "You should probably get some sleep."

He let his head fall back against the headrest. "I'm going to."

"Keep a hold of him," Luke said then, nodding to the kid. "You need to keep in contact with him."

Din glanced down at the kid, nestled in the crook of his arm. He still looked awful, but he seemed to be sleeping now, rather than simply being unconscious. He looked more at peace.

"I will," he promised. It was the easiest thing he'd ever said.

Luke turned back around to the controls. Blue smeared across the viewport now that they were in hyperspace, and the glass polarised to mute the flickering light. Din relaxed into the seat and closed his eyes—really, truly closed his eyes for the first time in what felt like weeks.

The kid was as safe as he could be for now, and they didn't have to fight any longer. They could rest. His friends were alive, despite everything, and the challenge Bo-Katan had issued to him couldn't be further from his mind. It was a problem for another time.

And his helmet could stay on, at least a little while longer.

When he fell asleep, he was not alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> in the interest of this not taking a million years to finish, I’ve decided to end this fic here. I fully intend to write an extended epilogue to tie everything together, and will hopefully have that finished soon-ish. Thank you so much to everyone who sent me encouraging words about this rewrite on tumblr, I really appreciate them!

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to @dinluke, @beskars, and @spooky-cadet on tumblr for helping me edit this!!!


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